to war
Michael McKernan Maslyn Williams Morag Fraser Peter Steele
Volume 3 Number 9 EURI:-KA srm:-s November 1993 A magazine of public affairs, the arts and theology
CoNTENTS 4 28 COMMENT PASSAGES OF ARMS Chris McGillion on the church and politi Peter Steele ponders war and the way in calleadership. which writers have rendered it. 5 35 VERIT ATIS SPLENDOR QUIXOTE The encyclical dissected by Morag Fraser, William Uren (p6), William Daniel (p8), 36 Andrew Hamilton (p9), Ray Cassin (plO), ALTERNATIVE WORLDS and John Ryan (pl2). Max Teichmann examines promises and reality in international politics. 13 CAPITAL LETTER 39 IN MEMORIAM 14 Andrew Bullen recalls the life and poetry of LETTERS Francis Webb. 16 44 A DOG'S BREAKFAST BOOKS AND ARTS Mark Skulley unravels the politics of Ross McMullin reviews Michael Cathcart's pay TV. abridgement of Manning Clark's A History of Australia; Margaret Simons visits writ 19 ers' week at Brisbane's Warana Festival ARCHIMEDES (p45), and the Asia-Pacific Triennial at the Queensland Art Gallery (pSO); Geoffrey 20 Milne surveys theatre in the Melbourne REPORTS International Festival (p46); Damien Col Dave Lane on newsagents in Canberra; eridge considers myths, marketing and the Frank Brennan on the Mabo outcome (p21 ); forthcoming Van Gogh exhibition at the Jon Greenaway on moves for a constitution National Gallery of Victoria (p48). al convention (p25). 51 22 FLASH IN THE PAN WHAT AUSTRALIANS REMEMBER Reviews of the films In the Line of Fire, The Cover: Australian soldier Michael McKernan reflects on the' Austral Nostradamus Kid, Blackfellas, So I Married on the western front. ians on the Western Front' commemora An Axe Murderer, BeDevil, Homelands, Photo: Courtesy of the Australian War MemorialiAWM negative £227). tive mission. Much Ado About Nothing, Macbeth and Othello. Photos pp2 and 28-31 24 by Reimund Zunde; Photo p 16 by Bill Thomas; POEM 54 Graphics pp20 and 48 by Siobhan jackson; To An Unknown Japanese Soldier, by VOICEBOX Graphic p44 by Tim Metherall; Maslyn Williams. Cartoon p25 by Peter Gale. 55 26 SPECIFIC LEVITY Eureka Street magazine FOREIGN CORRESPONDENCE Part II jesuit Publications Morag Fraser talks to Croatian philosopher PO Box 553 Richmond VIC 3121 Menad Miscevic about unpublicised con Tell03)427 7311 sequences of the Balkans war; in Cambo Fax (03)428 4450 dia, Mark Deasey visits Angkor (p41). EUAI:-KA srm:-t:r COMMENT A magazine of public affairs, the acts and theology CHRIS McGtLLION Publisher Michael Kelly SJ Editor Morag Fraser Production editor Ra y Cassin Goodbye Fr Chips Design consultant fohn van Loon Production assistants woe< mR R lR 4 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMilER 1993 of resources in the field of social policy research, the political leadership at its best. Some people will view better to concentrate efforts and expertise; lending more this kind of activity as a dangerous liaison between assistance to existing non-denominational welfare/ jus church and state, but does the separation of church and tice advocacy groups rather than risking the churches' state mean that morality should become the monopoly credibility through direct involvement; and developing of the former, and political activity of the latter? a better understanding of, and skills to deal with, the The Greek philosopher, Aristotle, put the case for realities of a mass media-oriented society. the essential indivisibility of morality and politics in These ideas all have merit, but they tend to miss the fourth century BC. 'A state', he argued, 'is some the point. It is not enough to stand outside the public thing more than a pact of mutual protection or an agree policy arena, urging the players on with the latest mod ment to exchange goods and services.' As if taking a el megaphone. Nor is it enough to venture into the arena wooden stake to the heart of the economic rationali ts purely for the purpose of more effectively doing the same. of his day, he went on to argue that the mere possession That won't change the nature or the outcome of the of contractual obligations did not make someone a cit game; it just adds to the background noise. In a reflec izen, for 'a state exists not simply for the purpose of tive report to the board of the Southern Christian Lead living together but for the sake of noble actions'. ership Council in 1959, the organisation's associate According to Aristotle, an association of people that fails director, Ella Baker, posed the que tion: 'Have we been to promote justice may be many things, but it is not a so busy doing the things that had to be done that we state. A citizen, properly understood, is someone who have failed to (do) what should be done?' Baker suggest engages in politics to promote virtue and goodness. ed, and the council eventually came to endorse, three It might be added that a church that does not take aims for the organisation: co-ordinating action by local social justice seriously enough to fight for it may be groups, developing potential black leaders, and, most many things but it is not fa ithful to the gospel of Jesus important of all, 'developing a vital movement of non Christ. And that a follower of Jesus, properly understood, violent direct mass action against racial discrimination'. is a citizen out to build a new heaven and a new earth in That is a far cry from issuing statements, lobbying the here and now. • politicians, or telling people over and over again about the need to think more seriously about social justice Chris McGillion writes for the Sydney Morning Her when it comes to tmderprivileged minority groups. It is ald. The encyclical L AST YEAR the American theologian Richard McCor authentic church teaching as well as in theological mick delivered a lecture, 'Moral theology in the year reflection.' 2000', at Georgetown University in Washington DC. There has not been much talk of modesty, let alone The lecture, the opening address in a distinguished se tentativeness, since the release last month of Veritatis ries on Catholic moral tradition, is worth seeking out Splendor, Pope John Paul IT 's encyclical letter on moral in its entirety (see America, 18 April 1992), but what teaching addressed to all the bishops of the Catholic struck me m ost forcibly about it were two terms Church. There has been some confusion (many people emphasised by McCormick. Looking forward, he called have not had access to the document, which was selec for a moral theology of 'modesty and tentativeness'. tively released); some anger at an anticipated 'tighten Expanding his theme, McCormick quoted from a ing up' of church discipline; and some enthusiastic 1981 'dream' (in Martin Luther King's sense) of theolo heralding of a 'return to moral certainties'. gian Karl Rahner's: 'In Rahner's dream the pope is im This month, in an spirit of unapologetic modesty, agined as saying: "The ordinary magisterium of the pope Eurelw Street devotes its comment pages to a detailed in authentic doctrinal decisions at least in the past and examination of the encyclical and its ramifications. We up to ve1y recent times was often involved in error and, welcome the response of our readers, whether or not on the other hand, Rome was accustomed to put forward they come from within the Catholic tradition. and insist on such decisions as if there could be no doubt Postscript: The English translation of Veritatis about their ultimate correctness and as if further Splendor opens with these words: 'The splendour of discussion of them was unbecoming a Catholic theolo truth shines forth in all the works of the Creator and, in gian."' a special way, in man, created in the image and likeness McCormick, like Raimer, has a dream, and it is no of God. Truth enlightens man's intelligence and shapes less prophetic: 'We are all aware of the genuine com his freedom, leading him to know and love the Lord.' plexity of many human moral problems. My dream, Twenty-five years after Vatican II, women still therefore, is that acknowledgement of this will take the languish, unacknowledged, in the wilderness. • form of appropriate modesty and tentativeness in -Morag Fraser V OLUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 5 THE CHURCH: 1 WrLLIAM UREN Thinlz of the consequences lT WAS WITH MORE than a little trep ence proceeded, one palliative-care ments in marriage. The experiences of idation that I went in late September specialist after another intima ted, with so many Christian couples were inte to StJohn's College, at the University graphic details drawn from their per grated with the insights and expertise of Queensland, to speak at the first sonal experience, that legalising vol of the bishops and moralists to articu National Conference on Death, Dy untary euthanasia or physician-assist late a model of the marriage relation ing and Euthanasia. I believe that, ed suicide was not the way to go if we ship that was, at least arguably, at the generally speaking, the Catholic view wanted to ensure that death and dying same time both true to the classical on death and dying is highly responsi remained a characteristically human tradition and responsive to the new ble both from a community and from and natural experience, rather than a understandings of the interpersonal an individual point of view. Death is violent and degrading one. relations of the spouses in marriage. an integral part of life, a final incident I recount this experience because I Only 'arguably', perhaps, and not in an illness rather than ultimately persuasively, a specifically new di at least as far as the Vati mension of it. Death, It would be a disasta if, because of what is in effect can was concerned. The therefore, should share an intolewnce on the part of the school now tragedy, however, was not in the dignity which ascendant in the Vatican, the Catholic contribution necessarily only that the the community ac to moral debate were cmtailed at this very critical majority recommenda cords to human life. It tions were rejected, but should not be subject time of evolving community moral consciousness. that this model of broad- to violence or invasion. ranging consultation was I was scheduled, however, to share believe it is a paradigm of the way in sidelined. The witness of experience the platform in my session with Dr which church and community should was once again minimalised, and the Malcolm Parker, the president of the interact in approaching so many of the commitment to abstract principles and Voluntary Euthanasia Society of ethical conundrums that confront us traditions was reinforced. Queensland. I believe that voluntary in the world in which we live, and to Veritatis Splendor bears signs that euthanasia will be the bioethical issue which last month's papal encyclical, this model continues to hold sway in of the '90s, even as artificial reproduc Veritatis Splendor, draws our atten the Vatican. I do not wish to underes tion was the issue of the '80s. There tion. We do need principles, but we timate the importance of the moralis are articulate, passionate and vocifer also need experience, 'hands on' exper ing homily on the rich young man in ous proponents of voluntary euthana ience. We need to draw on a multiplic the first chapter of the encyclical, or sia, especially for that small number ity of traditions and a multiplicity of the exhortations to courage and integ of cases where palliation is no longer experiences, both of theoretical and rity in maintaining Christian values effective and the incapacitated patient practical specialists and of men and in the third chapter, but the guts of the is dying in great pain. These are diffi women in the street. encyclical are in its second chapter. cult cases to which to respond, and to The church tried this once. In the There, a rather idiosyncratic Augus say that claims of patient autonomy wake of the discussions of the bishops tinian and voluntarist version of the for lethal injections must give way to at the Second Vatican Council, it es natural-law tradition is elaborated, the the community interest in maintain tablished the so-called 'Birth Control claims of truth over against conscience ing the interdict against killing can Commission' with groups of bishops are discussed, and various 'errors of often seem overly harsh and insensi on the one hand and groups of clergy, the day' are swept aside: teleologism, tive, especially to those who do not religious and laity on the other. Some consequentialism, proportionalism, share the Christian view of life as a gift were specialists in the area, others and the 'fundamental option'. These of God over which we exercise stew simply spoke from personal experi are the 'adversaries', in the classical ardship rather than dominion. ence. Both groups reconu11ended by tradition of the manuals of moral the It was, then, with some apprehen substantial majorities that the ban ology. They are assigned to the rag bag sion that I approached the topic I shared against the use of artificial contracep of 'moral relativism', even though, as with Dr Parker, 'The Sanctity of Life tives for exclusively contraceptive the encyclical somewhat reluctantly and Resource Allocation'. But in the purposes should be revised. admits, they each contain elements course of the conference my appre It was not just a crude poll. There that have been constantly exploited hension eased. Not because, indeed, emerged from the discussions of this within the Catholic tradition. One my articulation of the classical church mixed group a new understanding of has only to think, for instance, of the arguments on the dignity of life and marriage as a relational reality. It took importance of the notion of propor death and on the legitimacy of forego up the existing tradition and reinter tion in enunciating the archetypically ing disproportionate means of artifi preted it in the light of the basic Vati Catholic 'principle of double effect' cial support was particularly persua can II insight of the complementarity and in legitimising the withdrawal of sive, but rather because, as the confer- of the unitive and procreative ele- extraordinary means of artificial life 6 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMBER 1993 support from dying patients to ask sue are not peculiarly ecclesiastical associated in explaining the church's whether, in rejectingproportionalism, either in origin or in continuing de attitude towards infertile couples. this isn't just another case of shooting bate. The relation of action to habit 2. Was the instmction infallible? the messenger. and the way in which this affects My response was that it was not, that Those who are aware of the profile imputability, the legitimacy of includ it was on the fourth or fifth level of of the moralists associated presently ing and assessing significant conse authoritative Vatican statements, but with the Congregation of the Doc quences in the overall description of that it was certainly owed 'religious trine of the Faith will not be surprised the obj ect of a moral act, the way in assent'. that these theories have been singled which artifice affects nature and the 3. What did I think of the instmc out for condemnation. Further, if we appropriate limits that should be tion? I responded that I could only cast our minds back to the strictures drawn to protect against depersonali speak as a moral philosopher, but that against 'Modernism ' at the beginning sation, these are and have been the it seemed to me in this capacity that of the century and the instmctions of very stuff of debate in ethics fo r many the arguments were 'rather weak'. the Pontifical Biblical Commission centuries in the secular, as well as in For these responses I was duly re against asserting an alternative au the ecclesiastical, domain. To suggest ported to the Archbishop of Mel thor to Moses for the books of the that the debate is over for Catholics, bourne, to the Apostolic Delegate, to Pentateuch and a plurality of authors or that the church has better or more the Va tican and to the Jesuit General. for the Prophecy of Isaiah, we may persuasive answers, or that men and Later that sa me year I was attending a well see that what is now happening women of good will who pursue these Jesuit conference in Rome on behalf of to moral philosophers and theologians issues in the secular arena are inevita the Australian province, and I was has had depressing precedents in the bly misguided- this cannot but seem invited to explain my remarks to an area of scriptural exegesis. The encyc to be a large presumption. The invoca official who occupies a position of li ca l claims in paragraph 29 that 'the tion of the terminology of 'intrinsical considerable eminence in the Va tican church's magisterium does not intend ly evil acts' and 'moral relativism ' and and Jesuit hierarchy. I explained what to impose upon the faithful any par the subsuming of contraception into I had said, and obviously it corre ticular theological system, still less a the sa me category as genocide, torture sponded to the report that had reached philosophical one', but it is hard to sec and slavery should not be allowed to the Va tica n. There was a bemused that in these con- silence, and then the demnations it is The problems which are at issue .. . have been the very stuff official said: 'Yes, it is not severely lim of debate in ethics for many centuries, in the secular as well somewhat difficult. It iting the range of is reported that Cardi possible options as in the ecclesiastical, domain. To mggest that the debate is nal Ra tzingcr himself and attempting to over for Catholics, or that the church has better or more (the Prefect of the Sa put the lid on what persuasive answers, or that men and women of good will cred Congregation for has been fo r more who pursue these issues in the secular arena are inevitably the Doctrine of the than 30 years a Faith, who published very lively debate. misguided, cannot but seem to be a large presumption. the instmction ) is re It is as impor- puted to have said, not tant that this debate continue as it obscure the fac t that the orien tation that the arguments exactly were weak, was disastrous in 1906 and 1908 that pursued by the authors of the encycli but that "the moral psychology of the the debate on scriptural exegesis and cal is but one way of investigating the document needs strengthening" '! herm eneutics was suppressed. It took age-old pro blem of the May I respectfully suggest that a almost 40 years before Catholic scrip description of moral acts. comment along similar lines could be ture scholars were allowed to debate made about the present document, these matters again with their Protes M A Y I CON CLUDE with a person and that the best way to strengthen tant colleagues. The declining number alreminiscence. In 1987 after the pub the arguments is not to close off pub of Catholic scholars wishing to pur lication of the Vatican Instruction on lic debate, nor even to confine it to sue a career in moral philosophy and Respect fm Human Life in its Origin specialists, but to consult a widely theology is an index that there is a and on the Dignity of Procreation I representative and informed constit parallel feelingoffmstration and futil was asked to comment in tum by The uency both of specialists and of those ity among Catholic moralists in ad A ge and the ABC. There were three with 'hands on' experience among the dressing these very central areas of our broadly similar questions: People of God. As the encyclical wise church and community experience. It l. Would the publica tion of this ly remarks in trea ting of the necessity would be a disaster if, because of what instmction make any difference to to inform conscience, 'Sincerity is no is in effect an intolerance on the part Catholics who were involved in the substitute for tmth'. Neither, of course, of the school now ascendant in the IVF programs, either as doctors or as is uniform ity. • Va tican, the Catholic contribution to patients? I replied, of course, that any moral debate were curtailed at this answer on my part would be mere William Uren SJ is provincial superior very critical time of evolving commu speculation, but I had my doubts about of the Jesuits in Australia, and part nity moral consciousness. at least some of the doctors and some time lecturer in moral philosophy at For the problems which are at is- of the pa tients with whom I had been the University of Melbourne. VOLUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 7 THE CHURCH: 2 WILLIAM DANIEL can II pointed out in the passage just quoted, whatwassaidaboutthedigni ty of an erroneous conscience cannot Conscience in question apply 'when a person shows little con cern for seeking what is true and good, T E ENCYCLICAL Ventat1s Splendor take- it cannot be set right because, and conscience gradually becomes is addressed to the bishops of the by definition, I am unaware of my almost blind from being accustomed church, and concerns the method of mistaken notion. When my con to sin'. moral theology. A lot of its content is science makes a judgment out of this The Pope reminds his readers that, of a technical nature, although it could mistaken notion, it does not lose its in the church and its teaching office, have a profound effect on the way in dignity 'because even when it directs Christians have a great help in the which the Christian moral life is pre us to act in a way not in conformity formation of conscience. When the sented in catechesis and the written with the objective moral order, it con church pronounces on moral ques word. The points at which it may be tinues to speak in the name of that tions, he says, it in no way under said to impinge directly upon the life truthaboutthegoodwhich the subject mines the freedom of conscience of of the layperson arc the chapter on the is called to seck sincerely' (62). So the Christians. This is because freedom of dialogue between Jesus and the rich dignity of an erroneous conscience conscience is not freedom 'from' the young man (Matthew 19:16) and the lies in the fact that the person is still truth but freedom 'in' the truth. Be section on conscience. faithful to the quest for truth, and is sides, church teaching does not come Conscience, says the Pope, is an still open to its claims. Such a moral to the believer as something alien, but inner witness to our faithfulness or act is good even if it is not correct. It is as a development of the act of faith by unfaithfulness to the dem.ands of subjectively good, for the will is which the believer accepts the gospel morality. It is the only witness and a directed towards goodness, even and the church. 'The church puts her secret one, for no one else knows how though the reason has fail ed to discov self always and only at the service of we have responded to its voice. Con er the true good in this instance. conscience, helping it ... not to swerve science is an interior dialogue we hold The Pope's concern to defend from the truth about human good, but with ourselves and with God, and its objective morality against subjectiv rather ... to attain the truth with cer commands present themselves as ism leads him to the assertion that 'it tainty and to abide in it.' (64) coming from God (58). Conscience is is always from the truth that the dig The Pope speaks severely about a practical judgment that makes nity of conscience derives' (63). It is dissent from church teaching on the known what we are to do, and passes never acceptable, he says, 'to make part of theologians, 'in the form of judgment on what we have done. It the moral value of the act performed carefully orchestrated protests and has an imperative character: we must with a true and correct conscience polemics canied on in the media' (113 ). act in accordance with it. It is call ed equivalent to the moral value of an act He has less to say about private non 'the proximate norm of personal mor performed following the judgment of compliance with church teaching. He ality' (60) . This is standard Catholic an erroneous conscience'. In support does reject 'so-called "pastoral" solu doctrine, but the Pope is concerned of this he refers to an article of the De tions contrary to the teaching of the that, with the modern stress on free Veritate of Thomas Aquinas. There magisterium' (56), but these are based dom and the dignity of the conscience, Thomas does distinguish between the on a 'creative' view of conscience people have lost sight of the impor binding force of a true and an errone according to which conscience would tance of truth. Conscience does not ous conscience, but not between the make the final decision about what is create moral truth but seeks to find it. dignity of the two. A correct con good and what is evil. Moral truth is represented in the science binds absolutely because its This would not, in my view, rule divine law, which is the universal and judgment, being true, cannot be re out the position adopted by the Aus objective norm of morality. The judg versed. The erroneous conscience, on tralian bishops in 1974, who taught ment of conscience does not establish the other hand, binds in a modified that priests in their pastoral dealings the law, but bears witness to its au way and conditionally, because it may might accept the good faith of persons thority (60). A great deal of the encyc eventually come to be corrected and who felt unable to observe the church's lical is devoted to the importance of its judgment laid aside. teaching on contraception because of objective morality: this surely is a There is more work to be done, I special circumstances, e.g. the health message for modern society, whether suggest, on the question of the dignity of the wife, economic difficulties, Christian or not. In this context the of the erroneous conscience. It is wrong unwillingness of the other partner, a Pope considers the question of errone to argue that if we accept the dignity of threat to the marriage itself. The bish ous conscience. He quotes Vatican II: the erroneous conscience in an ordi- ops would say that this person's con 'Not infrequently conscience can be nary conscientious person, we must science was in error, but in using the mistaken as a result of invincible logically accept the dignity of con term' good faith' they were respecting ignorance, although it does not on science of a Hitler or a Stalin. Such its dignity. • that account forfeit its dignity.' people, who are dedicated to evil, have 'Invincible ignorance' is ignorance suppressed the voice of conscience William Daniel SJ lectures in moral that the person is unable to overcome. they cannot properly be said to be theology at Jesuit Theological Col It is the ignorance of the honest mis- following conscience at all. As Vati- lege, Parkville, Victoria. 8 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMBER 1993 THE CHURCH: 3 ANDREW HAMILTON A NY ENCYCLICAL IS LIKE a one-stop shopping centre. Everyone judges it by whether they find what they arc The claitns of integrity looking for, but only the seriou s shopper tests the depth of its resourc the demand of the gospel. But to be ing the implications of faith in Christ. es. So it is no surprise that the re able to ask insistently what the gospel He concludes with a peroration on the sponse to Veritatis Splendor has been commits us to as a community in martyrs, who are emblems of the seri so varied. Before adding to the Babel of such a way that we would give our ousness of moral choice, of its objec opinion about the encyclical, I should lives to it requires a strong sense both tivity and of the place of the commu name my interest. of the community and of a solid moral nity. Martyrs mark out the shape of In creasingly I have come to be universe. Both arc constantly threat integrity. li eve that there is only one question ened with erosion. When peace came From this description of my preoc that offers a promising basis for illu to El Salvador, the cohesion of the cupations and of the encyclical, it will minating discussion about serious community was threa tened by diverg be clear that I regard it as a good matters. That question is, what do we ing individual interest and a fuzziness document. At a general level it is an beli eve in such a way that we would about the non-negotiable demands of eloquent and even no be prepared to stake our lives on it? human dignity. ble claim for truth in the Any appeal for heroism The form in which I ask this ques I also fi nd my own sense of shared sense that I have de must reckon with the tion as a Catholic is what our faith in commitment to the claims of the gos scribed. It defends the Jesus Christ commits us to in such a pel weakened by cultural fashions that solidity of the moral fact that historically way that we would be prepared to live minimi e the claims of the communi universe and of the com there are always as and die for it. That is the question on ty on the individual and fragment the munity against forces which I look for encouragement and moral universe. Under such pressure that arc seen to erode many people who have illumination in any discussion about it is easy to settle for less exigent them. It insists that the been ready to kill for theology . Other questions may be im questions and to be less faithful in gospel makes claims portant, but only when that serious one's com1nitments. that may be costl y to the the faith as those question is clearly on the table. With such interests, I found the community of those ready to die for it. A year or two ago, I would have encyclical home ground. John Pau' II who follow the path of hesitated to have put the question as introduces the work by refl ecting on Jesus Christ. A document that sharply as this. For it makes an enor truth, as he has done in almost all his T o say, however, criticises schools of mous claim to the high moral ground, major addresses. He evokes Havel and that the encyclical di and apparently restricts the church to Solzhenitsyn, for whom tmth makes rects our attention elo thought within the an elite group that can face such ques a public claim. The encyclical says quently to the heart of church can easily lead tions with equanimity. I know, more that human dignity is based on a solid Christian commitment to recrimination and to over, my own cowardice and uncer moral universe in which there is a is not to say that its tainties all too well to be able to feel stable distinction between good and message will necessari a hunt for the guilty comfortably at home in such a group. evil. This moral universe exists inde ly be heard. For there is people . . . and to the It was the opportunity to share the pendently of whatever the regime de always the risk that the life of rural communities in El Salva clares of it. To speak of truth is also to central question will be belief that if they are dor that has made me bolder in nam say that this univer e makes a claim obscured by subordinate dealt with the claims ing this as my starting point. In those on us, and that our response is given questions, and so the communities ordinary people with the urgency and significance by our mem force of the encyclical of the gospel will ordinary range of human strengths bership of the human community. will be lost. About this I adequately have and weaknesses had to face this ques This reference to truth underlines the have three grounds for tion from day to day. They were called claims that the community makes on concern. been m et. to put their bodies where their an the individual, and the objectivity of In the first place, any swers were, and to make a shared the moral world. appeal for heroism must reckon with response. If, for example, some of the The encyclical is a document for the fact that historicall y there areal community were taken by the police believers. The Pope's central question ways as many people who have been for questioning, the others had to de has to do with what our community of ready to kill for the faith as those ready cide whether to go down to the police faith in Jesus Christ commits us to. to die for it. A document that critic station as a group to demand their For that reason he weaves his reflec ises schools of thought within the release, and so risk being beaten or tions into a homily on the story of the church, as the encyclical does, can killed themselves. rich young man. In the body of the text easily lead to recrimination and to a Their situation made it important he stresses the objectivity of the moral hunt for the guilty people, whether for them to name in practical terms world and also the claim that the theologians or bishops, and to the be what the gospel committed them to as community of faith has on the indi lief that, if they are dealt with, the a community. While they often failed viduals within it. This involves a claims of the gospel will adequately by these standards, they always re strong treatment of the place of the have been met. In El Salvador, the tumed to the central question about teaching office of the church in declar- claim of the gospel on the community V OLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 9 ~~~~~~~:· ~~~~~ could be diverted to encourage vio represent the church are again faithful man's predilection for wealth, should ce against the persecutors. In the in their teaching and do not dissent. win support in such circles, shows same way, an ea rlier encyclical agaiJ1St When this is done, Catholics will again that it is easily misunderstood. Modernism was followed by a witch accept that the demands of Christian Finally, though, the encycli cal does hunt throughout the church. life can be declared authoritatively by ask and insist on the right question: This diversion of focus would con the teaching office of the church. what are we willing to stake our lives tradict the claims of the gospel that Many Catholics, however, offer on together in our following of Jesus the encyclical defends. For the readi another diagnosis. They say that it has Christ. But in posing this challenge, ness to lay down our lives would be been the spontaneous judgment of the Pope is not a lone Horatio on the replaced by the willingness to destroy many Catholics about the morality of church bridge. others' lives. contraception that has made them In the daily life of the church this Secondly, any appeal for generosi suspicious of church authority on oth question is commended constantly. ty and any invitation to people to er areas to do with the gospel. In this In El Salvador, the living memmy of accept a solid moral universe and to respect the moral theologians only Archbishop Romero and of the mar accept the cla im s of the community reflect that judgment of Ca tholics. On tyred Jesuits and catechists provoked upon them must eventually meet the this second reading, the crisis facing it daily. I find it kept alive constantly practical issues in which such claims the teaching office in the church is by the lives of refugees and of volun arc cashed. In the communities in El more severe, for it now must com tary workers who have faced and an Salvador general exhortation soon mend its own wisdom and authority swered the large question with their turned to the business of food distri to interpret the claims of Christ in lives. Most will never read the encyc bution or appropriate resistance to detail. To curb the dissent of moral lical, but they have kept the faith. • army harassment. When the courses theologians would only suppress the of action involved cost and risk to the symptoms of a deeper malaise. Andrew Hamilton SJ teaches at the community they needed to be com If this explanation of the crisis that United Faculty ofThcology, Parkville, mended. At that point, the subordi the encyclical addresses has any valid Victoria. nate questions- those about the pro ity, the subordinate questions of its THE CHURCH: 4 cedures and wisdom of the leadership style and language, and of the process or the need for any planned action by w hich it was written, assumcgrcat R AY CASSIN become important. For if they were cr importance. For the more they al handled badly, the main issue of peo ienate Catholics, the less effective the ples' readiness to suffer in the name of encyclical will be in commending the Letters from the gospel was obscured. larger question with which it deals. In the reception of the encyclical Attention will remained fixed not on the issue that has so far dominated the common claims made by faith in on high media attention has been contracep Christ, but on the virtues and defects tion. This is the point at which many of people and procedures. people have seen the chips cashed. It is Which of these diagnoses is cor A FrER THE PREV IOUS bout of papal also the point at which many people rect is a matter for judgment. There is encyclical writing, which produced have doubted whether the following evidence for both. But the question CentesimusAmmsin 1991, theAmcr of Christ demands what the teaching docs impinge on the way the encycli ican Protestant theologian Harvey Cox authority of the church says. So, al ca l will be heard. was moved to write: 'Thesecularrcahn though the encyclical mentions prac Thirdly, the support that the en must be wincing in embarrassment tical issues like contraception only in cyclical has received from some cir about the derivative quality of this ho passing, the burden of its message will cles outside the church paradoxically hum document. But let us be more be obscured unless these issues are gives me grounds for concern. For some generous. What is exhausted is not the also dealt with. How can this be done? of those who have commended it most Pope but the social-encyclical genre Implicit within the encyclical is vigorously to the church have also itself, with its improbable claims to the judgment that some theologians been noted for their vigorous support universal validity and its consequent have been influenced by false currents for various varieties of economic lib temptation to resort to bland truisms. of secular thought, and that their pub eralism . These doctrines have been My hope is that Centesimus Annus lic dissent against the teaching of the notable for reducing society to indi marks not only the lOOth anniversmy church has confused the faithful on viduals motivated by the desire for of papal social teaching but the end of issues like contraception. On this wealth, and are most strongly opposed that chapter in Christian history.' analysis, theresultantdebateandcon to public restriction of profitmaking Veritatis Splendor doesn't quite fusion has made the faithful more from activities that the encyclical fit into what Cox ca lls the 'social vulnerable to other currents of thought would term immoral. The adherents encyclical' genre, because its scope is that arc incompatible with Christian of these doctrines have promoted the considerably broader than that of what faith. It has also eroded a proper re fragmented moral order that the en used to be called 'the worker ques spect for the teaching office within cyclical deplores. The fact that the tion'. But it's a pretty safe bet that Cox the church. The appropriate strategy, encyclical, which is based on the story still thinks that encyclical writing then, will be to ensure that those who of the Jesus' lament for the rich young should be a closed chapter in Christ- 10 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMBER 1993 ian history. I suspect that the only few individuals, and the utter poverty but the psychological reality to which judgment he might want to change is of the masses; in the increased self it referred has not. For even a much the one about bland truisms. reliance and closer mutual combina travelled pope like John Paul ll can be John Paul ll has been a prolific tion of the working classes; as also, a prisoner, a prisoner of his own writer of encyclicals, having present finally, in the prevailing moral degen rhetoric. ed the church with lOin his 15 years eracy ... wise men are discussing it; Perhaps John Paul would say that as Pope. They have been rather longer practical men are proposing schemes; in Veritatis Splendor he has kept up than the encyclicals of most of his popular meetings, legislatures and his end of the conversation that Duffy predecessors in this century, and he rulers of nations are all bus- talks about, by taking issue with theo has had agreaterpropensity than most """J"'"1 ied with it.' logians who are too deeply imbued of them, except Pius Xll, to use the with the perspective of m odern plu genre not only to address specific pas .1. HEY DON'T WRITE 'EM Jike that any ralist democracies. But a conversation toral questions but also as a vehicle for more, which is both a good thing and needs atleast two interlocutors, and it programmatic theological reflection. a bad thing. Good, because complex is not obvious, from the way Verita tis I think Cox is right to suggest that post-industrial societies in the late Splendor treats our theological tradi the encyclical genre has outlived its 20th century could not easily be de tion, that a conversation is going on. usefulness, and the reasons why he is scribed by the sweeping judgments The theologians whom the encyc right go beyond the content of any one that seemed possible in 1891. And lical castigates as 'teleologists', 'con encyclical. Popes have always written bad, because the forceful rhetoric in sequentialists' and 'proportionalists' letters, of course, and issued their pro which those sweeping judgments were have built their work out of many clamations and condemnations. But expressed is now all spent. sources, including the analysis of the great age of encyclical writing is By way of contrast with the grand moral judgment to be found in the relatively recent; the encyclical is a iloquent Leo, here is the ponderous second part of Thomas Aquinas' particular style of papal utterance that John Paul IT, marking the 100th anni Summa Theologiae and the theories reflects-and partly constitutes-a versary of Rerum Novarum in Cen of virtue ethics that various secular particular style of papal government. tesimus A 1m us: 'The Pope's [i.e. Leo's] philosophers have developed during The kind of encyclical with which approach in publishing Rerum No the past three decades. Not all of those we are now familiar became the popes' varum gave the church "citizenship secular philosophers have been Cath favoured medium of communication status" as it were, amid the changing olic, though in their arguments most after the papal states were absorbed by realities of public life, and this stand have delivered atleast a passing nod to the Kingdom of Italy in 1870. Pius IX, ing would be more fully confirmed Thomas as well as to his (and their) that fainthearted liberal turned thor later on. In effect, to teach and to philosophical mentor, Aristotle. It is a oughgoing reactionary, shut himself spread her social doctrine pertains to sad irony that, in their knowledge of up in the Vatican and refused to deal the church's evangelising mission and what Thomas actually says, those with the secular power he believed is an essential part of the Christian secular philosophers have shown had stolen his patrimony. Thereafter, message, since tl1is doctrine points themselves to be better participants the popes, as princes without a prince out the direct consequences of that in the conversation than has the Pope. dom, had to address their appeals not message ... ' This reads like a m emo There arc good Catholic reasons to fellow sovereigns but to the bishops randum from Sir Humphrey Appleby, for sharing Harvey Cox's Protestant and faithful of the Catholic world. without the jokes. doubts about the continued effective The formal dispute between Italy and The Cambridge historian Eamon ness of the encyclical genre. It is not a the Holy See was settled by the con Duffy argues that 'Catholicism is a question of whether popes should cordat of 1929, but the modem encyc conversation, linking continents and sometimes offer general reflections lical bas continued to be a strange cultures, and reaching backwards and on moral questions; of course they hybrid: part pastoral exhortation, and forwards in time. The luxury of sec should. It is a question of how best to part missive from a prince in exile, tarianism, of renouncing whatever in keep the conversation going. And at seeking to rally his faithful subjects. It the conversation cannot be squared the moment there is not much sense is a defensive genre, suited to an insti with the perspective of one's own time that the Vatican is interested in a ttition that feels beleaguered. and place, is not an option.' Quite so, conversation 'reaching backwards and But defensiveness can take time to Eamon, quite so. And what a pity that forwards in time'. Reading VeriLatis run out of vigour-about 100 years, as some of the occupants of St Peter's Splendor, one feels that the dialogue it has turned out. Here is Pius IX's Chair have been less than adept at the only moves between Rome, circa 1870, feisty successor, Leo xm, catching up art of conversation. and Warsaw, circa 1950. (The encycli with the industrial revolution in Re After Pius IX farewelled his troops cal's heavy dose of Augustine does not rum Novarum (1891): 'The elements at the Lateran Palace, withdrew into contradict this; it confirms it.) of the conflict now raging are unmis the Vatican and shunned contact with Catholicism has a much longer histo takable, in the vast expansion of in modernity as represented by the Ital ry than that, and its conversation dustrial pursuits and the marvellous ian state, it became customary among should reflect that history. • discoveries of science; in the changed political Catholics to refer to the Pope relations between masters and work as 'the prisoner of the Vatican'. The Ray Cassin is a member of Eurelw men; in the enormous fortunes of some phrase has disappeared, and rightly so, Street's staff. VOLUME 3 NUMB ER 9 • EUREKA STREET 11 THE CHURCH: 5 JoHN E. R YAN In seeking to prepare m yself to receive this encyclical fruitfully, I found myself recalling that life as we live it is inevitably a complex matter. Sweet grapes and sour grapes Often enough we find ourselves fac ed A homily for the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time with conflicting values and for the sake of doing one good thing we might have to pass up or miss out on some I expected my vineyard to yield sweet receive this teaching positively and thing else. For instance, in order to grapes. Why did it yield sour grapes fruitfully. In response I found myself protect our family we might some instead! recalling some truths of our faith. times be forced to tell an untruth. The First, the nam e of this encyclical is nitty-gritty circumstances of day-to 'The Splendor Of Truth', and it is well day living can demand that we be named, for it is the church's role to selective inchoosingwhatgood things L Po"'' w c, c um • d&";c; lead LI S to freedom, life and truth. If we are able or not abl e to do . some controversial moral issues: ques then we are genuinely trying to serve If we have not yet come to know tions such as abortion, birth control, God and our neighbour and find that God as mercy and compassion we will divorce, homosexuality and premari for whatever reason it is binding us, have difficulty in living with the inev tal sex. Indeed, these are not just con destroying LIS or leading us into confu itable messiness of life. At times we troversial issues; for many people, they sion and conflict, then we may pre might find ourselves seeking more are issues of life and dea th! sume that we are not getting its true clarity than it is possible to have. And In the context of today's readings I message. While what the Spirit calls we may be unable to rest with the found myself wondering what effects us to is not always easy the Letter to knowledge that all God asks of us is this encyclical willhavconourchurch. the Galatians tells us that the fru its of our reasonable best shot. Some of us Will it produce sweet grapes or sour the Spirit are: love, joy, peace, patient find it hard to live with imperfection grapes? Will it lead us to grea ter life endurance, kindness, generosity, faith, and accept the fa ct that we all sin and the mutual love and support we mildness and chastity. many times each day. All of us are in are called to as the church, or will it As we well know, there is a lot of constant need of God's mercy and bring further antagonism and divi confusion around many of the issues compassion. (Proverbs 24: 16). sions? Certainly there is a danger, as that this encyclical touches on. While Without this basic awareness of recent history suggests, that such state it is the role of those in authority in our sinfulness, we get into all sorts of ments often end up with yet another the church to articulate for us the ga me-playing and do all kinds of funny group being ali enated fro m the church. story of how the Spirit is ca lling us, it things with what is demanded of us. With these thoughts in mind I is oft en hard to find ways to express Whenever our image of God falls short began to ask how I might prepare to this story adequately. It is very easy of seeing Him as mercy and compas for the true message to get sion, we can easily make the rules, the lost in the transmission. So laws and teaching into idols.This is THE SCHEME if those fruits of the Spirit like living with a sign post rather than are not in evidence, then moving towards the place to which THE ClffiiSTIAN BROTHERS IN CHILD whatever it is that we are the sign post points. CARE IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA hearing, it is not from God. Let us remind ourselves that in so I then recall ed that too many areas of life weare unable to live The Catholic orphanages in W.A. ma naged by the Christian Broth many of us, even as adults, up to the full demands of the gospel. ers (1897 -1983) have become controversial since the release ofbooks still rely almost exclusive How many of us ca n live up to the call and T.V. mini series such as 'Lost Children of the Empire' a nd 'The ly on the voice of the Spirit and challenge of fraternal charity I All Leaving of Liverpool'. THE SCHEME is a history of the four institu as it comes to us from the of us fall short many times, and we tions: Clontarf, Castledare, Boys Town, Bindoon and StMary's Agri external authority. We are should not expect it to be all that cultural School, Tardun in the context of the media controversy. not well attuned to listen to different in areas of sexual morality. H eavily b ased on primary sources, liberally illustrated, THE that inner voice which the Please God, the release of this new SCHEME faces the issues squarely: apart from the formal history external story sets off with encyclical will give us all an opportu chapters, sections include: 'Physical abuse in the traditional orphan in us. It is good to remind nity to look again at the way we live age'; 'The sexual underworld' and 'Pocket money, wages, 'slavery' and ourselves again that and our attitudes to the directives 'exploitation'. Author: Barry M. Coldrey, Ph.D although we should always regarding morality that come to us respect and remain open to from the teaching authority within Hard cover, with detailed endnotes and comprehensive bibliography, the external teaching, the the church. As the Gospel reading plus a complete register of staff and students who worked in the four ultimate voice that we all reminds us, there is a real possibility institutions; (4000 names). ISBN 1 86307 027 3. Austed Publishing, have to obey is the inner that those who produce sour grapes P erth. R.R.P. $29.95 plus $2.50 p. & p. release date: mid-November voice of our conscience. Our will lose the Kingdom. • 1993. From: 53 Redmond Street Manning, W.A. 6152. P.O. Box 106, conscience is nothing other Como. W.A. 6152. Ph.: (09) 450 5311 Fax: (09) 450 6370. Cheques: than the voice of the Spirit John E. Ryan is a priest of the diocese 'Christian Brothers'. within us. of Sandhurst. 12 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMBER 1993 Leading means more than surviving I T WAS A GREAT TJUUM'H fo, P•ul KeMing when he thoughts about Aboriginal reconciliation and republics signed up the Aborigines on the Mabo deal, and-more rather than watching the till; keeping an eye on minis or less-the dissident senators on the budget bills. Or ters in trouble; paying attention to issues that might so all the commentators said. There was a lot of chat blow up; and, not least, playing with the levers to deal about his new mood of determination since returning with issues such as unemployment. He was always bad from overseas, and how he was finally getting back to at meetings-particularly at chairing them-and always work. But don't get too optimistic. Keating's presiden better with informal discussions and doing things on tial style is changing yet again-he is in his third trans the nm. Keating may have had deep contempt for Bob formation in 18 months-but there are still serious flaws Hawke and his lack of ideals and inability to 'nurture' in his style of government and they have every capacity the party, but Hawke, for his faults, was not a bad man to bring hin1 down. ager, conciliator and chairman, and ran a fairly smooth Keating has certainly moved out of the prolonged machine. daze that, since the election, saw him lose almost all Most of the Cabinet ministers who stayed with interest in the day-to-day workings of government. In Hawke to the end (although, it is to be remembered, it stead he concentrated on some big issues, but even then was just these who told him his time was up) have not he devoted almost all of his time to broad principles, been reconciled to Keating. It is not their fault-the good failing to involve himself in the nitty-gritty. That style will, generally, is there; it is simply that Keating has was beginning to hurt him very badly, not least amongst not developed a basic working relationship into any his core supporters on the Labor right. It was Keating's sense of partnership, shared goals or political friendship. inattention to detail, his failure to ensure that hard po That many of them are functional ministers, more or litical calculation went into the budget process, which less bound to oppose him on details of the noble goals made the Dawkins' budget such a fiasco, and which pro (over Mabo, say), probably does not help. It was their longed the agony of rescuing it. Keating's first response absence from the ilmer councils that meant that very to the problem was a virtuoso display of his monstering little political nous or hard judgment went into the budg talents- which worked not a jot-and a now familiar et details; Keating was also absent from the thinking pattern of missed meetings and mucking around. When process, and Dawkins, for all of his abilities, simply lacks he finally turned to it as a problem, we saw the wheed gut instinct. ling and wooing Keating at his best. But why did he These ministers are, essentially, putting their heads wait so long? down and concentrating on their departmental level Similarly, Keating left Mabo drift along far too long, work, and taking care to keep out of the spotlight. One leaving the negotiations to others and astonishingly ig does not hear much voluntarily from, say, Robert Ray, norant of any points of detail, until finally he was Kim Beazley, Gareth Evans or Nick Bolkus at the mo shocked by the realisation that the package being ment. Not even the supposed young blood- Michael stitched up faced fundamental opposition from Aborig Lee or Michael Lavarch- have made any impact. Peter inal interests. Previously he had thought that the loud Baldwin, sensibly, is keeping his head clown. Brian Howe, noises were mere negotiating ploys. Again Keating Alan Griffith, Simon Crean and Ros Kelly are also qui showed a skill: his focus on a political result is such et, though less comfortably so. Bob Collins is licking that he can do a complete policy somersault overnight, his wow1ds, and John Dawkins ought to be. Bob Mc without a blinl<, in the interests of an enduring deal. Mullan is enhancing a reputation, but very quietly. Lau These, and some other signs of a new self-confi rie Brereton is well on the way to proving that hubris dence, along with the disappearance of much of the can strike twice il1 the one place. moody, aggrieved, withdrawn and nasty-tempered per A change ii1 Keating's office is one cause for hope. sona often on display of late, have sent Labor's morale Keating's fanner chief adviser, Don Russell (now am soaring. But pessimists wonder how long it can last. bassador to Washington), ran a chaotic organisation. But Why, for example, did it take Mabo and a trip abroad to a bright young bureaucrat-Allan Hawke, a fanner dep make Keating realise that things were seriously awry? uty secretary in the Defence department-has taken Even if both the evidence and the media's focus on it is over. He is putting a lot of work into rebuilding bridges: disregarded, he had been getting all the warning signs chattii1g up the backbenchers, listening to the minis from factional colleagues; yet he rebuffed them with a ters and trying to get some order, priority and strategy ferocity that may have left lasting wow1ds. into affairs. He is starting to break down some of the But the real problem is with the routine business anger at Keating, but so far it is not clear that Keating of government, and, to a degree, with festering discon has taken an eye off the road map to put it back on the tent from the drawn-out succession stmggle. Keating is road. He won't get there tmless he does. • not governing through Cabinet. It is partly because he has been disengaged: thinking grand and noble long-tem1 Jack Waterford is deputy editor of The Canberra Times V oLUME 3 NuMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 13 LETTERS Women form Eurel 14 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMBER 1993 pensive and widely available prelimi expanding developments. It lies at the Modules of knowledge are prepared nary to more advanced and special structural heart of most programs of by the best scholars (indeed, preparing ised education, the opportunity for part-time, adult, distance, and life an Open Learning unit which may selection and self-selection for ad long education. Credits for clearly then be offered for some years is an vanced study, the dropping out with defined units of knowledge, and the excellent way to combine teaching out undue frustration or waste of those transferability and accumulation of and research without overburdening who reach limits of their interest or these credits, are rightly perceived by the researcher) and delivered by a mix ability, etc. Australia's Department of Employ ture of traditional and new high tech Reforming or adapting education ment, Education and Training as im means to anyone anywhere. by putting it in smaller packages has a portant contributors to the expansion Open Learning doesn't offer de long and effective history, beginning and adaptability of post-school educa grees, just knowledge and proof of its well before the two-year college and tion. New Zealand has taken these possession. OL units can meet some the 'associate degree', much less the of the demands for knowledge which use of terms like 'modularisation'. In Professor Jevons rightly sees coming the post-Civil War United States the from the young and uncertain, the needs, for both liberal and an increas life-long learner, those in need of fur ing range of specialised study, the var ther education and training, those with iable preparation and goals of students, leisure and curiosity. Open Learning and the philosophical imperatives of will fonn a useful part of a modern democracy and choice were met first higher education system diverse at Harvard, then more generally, by enough to meet the needs of many electives, units of study, credit points: 'mass' clienteles, whatever the shape in modern jargon, modularisation. that system and its degrees may take. University degrees would be assem principles further: its Qualifications If the two-year degree, or some other bled by the student out of blocks of Authority hopes to define all learning new qualification, becomes popular, study or credits. The requirements of experiences in modular, credit-bear Open Learning will be there. The idea method, rigour, and cohesiveness ing tenns so that all these units may of modules or packages of know ledge, would be met by requiring 'majors' or be fitted into a national framework of flexible in content and combination, sequences of study; the need for gener credentials and qualifications. creditable towards various qualifica al education and the well-rounded Open Learning is in the business tion , has assisted the expansion and mind would be met by 'distribution of offering first class learning opportu diversification of higher education for requirements'-the insistence that nities, defined as units of knowledge. at least a century. It will continue to students study something different to These units arc creditable towards a do so, and Open Learning will be an their major interests. growing range of degrees and awards. important part of the process. Perhaps Decades before the discussion of The quality of the units is assured by our motto should be 'You can take an 'life-long learning', modules of learn such customary mechanisms as ex OL unit anywhere.' ing, credits and credit transfer had pert review and over sight by estab A.L Pritchard made America the home of the flexi lished institutions, but the real basis D.R. Jones ble and portable credential. The unit of our credibility is our excellence. Parkville, VIC (elective, credit, module, etc.) of learn ing has been an effective cure for the problem of a rigid and prescriptive curriculum dedicated to providing one YARRA THEOLOGICAL UNION sort of education for one sort of stu dent. (The prescription need not be An Associated Teaching Institution of universally applied. A century after Elliot introduced electives at Harvard, The Melbourne College of Divinity institutions and faculties with pre scriptive curricula still flourish along offers side the modular mode. Reform in higher education is often additive, at Bachelor's, Master's and Doctor's Degrees in Theology and least at first. The new appears beside the old; over time a dialectic of com combined Bachelor of Arts--Bachelor of Theology Degrees petition and co-operation often leads in conjunction with Monash University and the University of Melbourne to a new synthesis, by which time the YTU also offers its own Diplomas in a variety initially apparent conflict may be long forgotten.) of Theological Disciplines Today in Australasia, the princi ENROLMENTS NOW OPEN (lectures begin 21/02/94, handbook $7 posted) ple of the building block or module of knowledge, capable of being fitted into Further information: The Registrar, PO Box 79, Box Hill, 3128 many patterns, is part of many new or Tel: 890 3771,898 2240 VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 15 Photo: Bill Thomas A T"'' ""GHT onH' Guce W M, Colonel Mmm lies of the mulberry-faces-dozing-deep variety saw pay mar Gaddafi personally called the foreign desk of the TV as just more telly. Australia is finally getting pay Cable News Network in Atlanta and asked for airtime. TV because it would soon be widely availabl e from They hung up, twice. The Libya n ambassador then foreign-owned sa tellites, subject to scant government ca lled, wanting to know why nobody would speak to regulation and little profit for locals. his leader. Two hours later, Gaddafi burst through Lib The Keating government opted for a sa tellite sys ya's isolation by going straight into the ether. The Los tem (see box on pl 7) using digital compression technol Angeles Times later commented about CNN's cover ogy, which vastl y increases the number of channels but age: 'It was perhaps never so clear as during the war that is still not commercially available. The government leg television had become a full-fl edged participant in in islated to delay introduction of the cheaper MDS sys ternational affairs rather than simply a witness.' tem, arguing it was not the best technology and could CNN is only a blip on the big picture. The world's not be received by all Australians. Optus was also sold fastest-growing industry-communications-plans an the troubled Aussat satellite system for $800 million 'info rmation superhighway' into the home. Alliances on the understanding it would carry pay TV. are forming for the 21st century amid the convergence In themy , the first player, not the best teclmology, of telephone technology, computers, television, videos will be the big wi1mer in the pay TV market. Satellite and movies. The latest manoeuvre is the $45 billion and MDS systems need different decoders for home re merger in the US between the Bell Atlantic telephone ception, and viewers are unlikely to buy both. Rupert company and Tele-Communications Inc, America's big Murdoch failed to win a licence to broadcast pay TV in gest cable-TV outfit. Britain, but his Sky TV got in first, using a Luxembourg Australia's pay-TV policy has been pulled in oppo based satellite system . His competitor had better tech site directions for more than a decade, by free market nology but never caught up, and the two later m erged eers in the communications burea ucracy and by the long to form BSkyB. tradition of political patronage towards m edia A minnow in the broadcasting pond, UCOM Aus proprietors.Th e Hawke and Keating governments have tralia, and another related company, eventually won the had eight communica tions ministers since 1987. Pol- controversial tenders for the two m ain sa tellite 16 EUREKA STREET • N O VEMilER 1993 licences.At the time of writing, UCOM had passed scru NSW Law Society against the wishes of staff. The weekly tiny from the Trade Practices Commission in its bid for sheep dog trials have signs for Pal dog food in key cam licence A (four channels) and had a month to settle the era angles. The co-producer of Consuming Passions, the $97 million purchase price. Details were unclear on Perth-based Markham International, sent a letter last ownership of licence B (four charu1elsL the only licence year assuring potential sponsors of 'considerable scope open to existing media proprietors. Setting up a satel in suggesting recipes, treatments and persmmel involved lite delivery system is expected to take 12-18 months in each show.' Five episodes of Consuming Passions and to cost perhaps $300 million. Pay TV via MDS can have been rejected for not meeting guidelines covering start after the satellite service begins or in Januaty 1995, sponsorship. so it's still an open race. The ABC's satellite service into Asia, Australia Waiting in the mounting yard is the heayweight Television International, has perhaps ironically, been PMT consortium-Kerry Packer's Nine Network, Mur criticised for only getting three sponsors since it began doch's News Corporation, Telecom and the Seven and in February. ATVI is transmitted via Indonesia's Palapa Ten networks. The cut-throat ratings battle between satellite, which has a 'footprint' covering 15 countries Nine and Seven makes the group unstable but they are including Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, the Philip stayers individually. News Corp has the Fox film studios pines, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong and and television network in the US and splurged $770 south China. It shows ABC programs such as Play million for control of the Hong Kong-based Star TV, the School, Lateline, Mr Squiggle, Quantum and Four Cor dominant Asian satellite broadcaster. It plans a network ners, plus its own nightly news bulletin, assembled by covering Europe, Asia and the Americas and wants to a small team in Darwin led by joumalist Prakash Mir link up with a major telephone company. chandani. Murdoch has proposed that News Corp issue 'su The service was begun with a one-off federal grant per shares' to existing shareholders. A massive issue of of $5.4 million, and is believed to have about $3 million new shares with reduced voting rights would inject $4 left plus about $1 million from sponsorship. In a trou billion-$5 billion into the company while allowing the bled start, former Sixty Minutes producer Ben Hawke Murdoch family to maintain control. The controversial succeeded ABC staffer Bruce Donald as head of the super shares are allowed in the US but are new to Aus tralia. News also has to turn around the loss-making Star TV and overcome restrictions on satellite broad Pay TV means paying more for extra channels brought into your casting in some Asian countries. home for perhaps $30-$50 a month for a subscription package. News Corp and Telecom are major shareholders in The basic delivety systems are: the Seven network and are investigating joint ventures Satellite: Broadcasts direct to home receiving dish. A 60cm dish in Asia. Faced with competition and eventual privatisa in south-eastern Australia and Perth will get good pictures, big tion, Telecom plans to lift its earnings overseas and in ger dishes needed elsewhere. Equipment possibly two or three new ventures at home, using pay TV to help pay for the times as expensive as MDS. hardware. Telecom claims that its ADSL technology, MDS: Radio microwaves transmitted from a beacon on the which transmits video signals on existing copper tele phone wires, will be ready for commercial use in 1995- ground. Equipment will possibly cost about $400-$500. Operates 96-although industry insiders say that is a highly on line-of-sight, causing problems in hilly locations lil VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 17 as rugby league and the AFL. 'Australian businessmen state broadcasters that do not take advertising, and that in the region seem to be cleaning up their act, but som.e even the Beeb gets compulsmy licence fees. He also cites of them are still very parochial/ Broinowski says. 'If they the audience that US television networks have lost to start liking A TVI too much then perhaps it's not show pay TV in the last decade. 'I think there's a lot of self ing the most appropriate programming to attract indig serving, comfortable armchair rhetoric that always gets enous audiences.' engaged in an organisation as large and as complex as ATVI's line-up has been boosted by the Phoenix the ABC. That's not to pooh-pooh criticism. I just think crime series, Foreign Conespondent, Open Learning a lot of criticism is built upon romantic notions of the programs and a selection of SBS shows. Local broadcast way life operates which are in blind indifference to ers in the Philippines, Singapore, Bangkok and China's what's happening in the legislative forums of the na booming Guangdong province have agreed to use part tion, what's happening in the broadcasting markets and or all of the service. ATVI director Ben Hawke says its what's happening with audiences.' news is 'sensitive without being censored', with the Bruce Donald, a former member of the ABC execu ABC's regional correspondents supplying more Asian tive, says the overall cost of the ABC joint venture will content than either CNN or the BBC World Service. top $200 million over several years. He can't see the Radio Australia has begun providing news bulletins ABC getting a return on its money in the current pay on ATVI in Indonesian, Cantonese and Man- TV market. 'I'm now of the view that the ABC should darin. cut its losses and use the $12.5 million of public money for something better-improving programs rather than A THOME, THE ABC WILL GET satellite licence C for getting obsessed with delivety systems. That won't be two pay-TV channels-one for news and infon11ation, popular with David and Kim because they have put their and another for children's shows between 6am and 6pm professional lives on this, but I think they should be and an evening mix of documentaries and cultural pro bigger than that and they should admit that the time grams including Australian drama, music and comedy. has come to cut their losses.' Williams retorts: 'Bruce The news chatmel's 70-100 journalists will focus on na Donald is talking through his hat ... Bruce has had no tional politics, with live crosses to important news con involvement whatsoever in any of the business plan ferences, parliamentary sittings and committee hearings, ning to do with pay television.' plus detailed information on finance, sports and weather. David Hill is also at odds with Peter Manning, until recently editor of ABC television's news and current affairs. The two differ on internal management issues, The PMT consortium but Manning has also sought to insulate the ABC's free Kerry Packer: controls the Nine network, Australian Consolidated to-air news and current affairs from possible commer cial connections. Hill insists they arc safeguarded. Press, which publishes half of Australia's best-selling magazines, Chris Anderson, a former chief executive of John 15 per cent of John Fairfax newspapers. Fairfax newspapers, was appointed this year to a new Rupert Murdoch: News Corp publishes 66 per cent of Australia's position above Manning overseeing ABC TV news and capital-city daily newspapers, and more of the Sunday papers. Has information services. Anderson praises Manning and 15 per cent of Seven network, controls Pacific Magazines and Print ABC news and current affairs, but says all organisations ing (26 per cent of magazines). have to change. 'I'm not talking about sponsorship, for Telecom: Local telecommunications giant with $900 million profit goodness' sake. I'm open to new programming ideas. last year and operating revenue of $12.7 billion. Has 10 per cent of We've got to reach a broader and more diversified audi Seven network, investigating Asian joint ventures with News Corp. ence ... the demographics are slightly skewed towards an older audience.' Is Mam1ing in managem ent limbo? Seven network. 'My role is to oversee news and information and current Network Ten. affairs ... Manning's job is as the editor of the news and current affairs service on television, and that job remains-' Soon after Eureka Street spoke to Anderson, The ABC will have a wholly-owned subsidiary Mam1ing switched jobs and became general manager of called Astra, which will have a majority shareholding Radio National. A new position of managing editor for in the operating company. Private investment of $37.5 TV and radio, ranking above Anderson's present job, has million-$87.5 million is being sought. The ABC's head reportedly been created. It is believed Ander- of pay TV, Kim Williams, says the corporate structure son will apply for the post. will insulate the parent from any risk apart from the one-off federal grant of $12.5 million. 'None of it will sBS WILL HAVE a wholly-owned subsidia1y involved proceed if it doesn't add up. ' with private investors in an ethnic language service us Williams-a friend and possible successor to Dav ing leased capacity. It will show six hours of new pro id Hill- refuses to be drawn on whether the ABC pay grams a day 'turned over' twice on four channels will take advertising once it is allowed in 1997. channels-Italian, Greek, Arabic and Chinese (Manda But he points out that the ABC and BBC are the only rin and Cantonese). The managing director of SBS, Mal- 18 EUREKA STREET • NovEMilER 1993 cohn Long, says the pay channels will be 'obviously and Old wrinldies consciously different' from the free-to air service. 'What people seek is a very broad service which includes vari ety, soaps and game shows as well as news, current affairs, movies and so on. Long says the SBS free-to-air W!UNKLES IN TIME is the witty title of George Smoot's service is watched by four million Australians a week, about-to-be-published tory of what Stephen Hawking and is used regularly by 50-70 per cent of the ethnic called 'The scientific discovery of the century, if not of community. all time'. This is a 'folksy' book. Cosmological threads Steve Cosser's Australis Media holds 12 MDS are woven in and out of stories about peoples and plac licences in both Sydney and Melbourne and plans to es. The basic plot, however, has to do with Smoot's dis have channels operating by the end of the year in Ital covery of evidence for cosmos-wide ripples of radiation ian, Greek, Arabic, Chinese (Cantonese and Mandarin) that, he claims, are echoes of the initial explosions at and Vietnamese. Carl Johnson, managing director of the the moment that stars and galaxies began to form, only company's operating channel in Melbourne, Teleitalia, a few hundred thousand years after the Big Bang. says the 1000 subscribers tend to be blue-collar, older Big-Bang theory does not account for the rapid for Italians, unlike the core SBS audience of middle-class mation of large-scale structures early in the life of the English speakers. 'They don't want Fellini movies. They cosmos, unless there was some kind of 'hiccup' or 'ani tend to watch the Italian equivalent of Sons and Daugh sotropy' in these growth stages. How and when did 'sol ters or games shows, popular movies.' id matter' evolve? Since 1974, Smoot and his team, who Pay TV will allow a host of 'narrowcaster 'appeal work out of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in Califor ing to limited or localised audiences such as services in nia, have been seeking for evidence of such ripples in ethnic languages and special interest groups. Michelle the fabric of space-time in the background radiation of McAuslan, principal solicitor with the Communications the cosmos. A satellite launched in 1980 provided 70 Law Centre, says that narrowcasters face few checks on million measurements a year, surveying the entire sky foreign ownership and media concentration. She says for minute variations in temperature. the public also needs a window into the regulation of Because many other cosmic research programs have broadcasting. 'Not necessarily a full hearing in the court been found to be inconclusive, Smoot's research was room sense, but putting all the relevant documents on both meticulous and shrouded in secrecy. He offered the public record and allowing comment-' his students outrageous rewards if they could find any The legislation creating the Australian Broadcast error in his calculations. But, as he got closer to map ing Authority allows for investigations but public hear ping the universe with a pattern of 'starting points', ings are not mandatory. ABA spokesman Donald Smoot became more and more excited. In the spirit of Robertson says: 'It's something that we don't have a Archimedes, early in the morning one of his assistants policy on. It depends on the particular investigation.' left a print-out under his door with a note attached say Since Murdoch is an American citizen, the ABA may ing, 'Here are the plots you asked for. Eureka?'. have to rule on whether the links between News Corp What he found was a trace of the universe at 300,000 and Telecom make them associates. News Corp and years old, except that the ripples were much more than Telecom hold 25 per cent of the Seven network between 300,000 light years across. Witl1out these ripples, mat them, and the limit on foreign ownership is 20 per cent. ter would be evenly distributed across the universe and The Trade Practices Commission and the ABA may have no galaxies would have formed. Knowing how and when to rule on the PMT syndicate if it eventually wins a pay 'lumpiness' began in the Lmiverse, we can also guess TV licence. Telecom is in a private pay TV syndicate more about the future of the universe. And of course, and is required by the telecommunications regulator, none of the speculation is certain, even though the evi Austel, to allow other players equal access to its net dence is strong. Similar evidence from rival research work. teams proved to be corrupted by temperature effects from Rupert Murdoch sees the bigger picture. He said in rocket engines in space! a major speech in London that advances in telecommu Unlike Stephen Hawking and Steven Weinberg, in nications had liberated people from the 'once powerful many ways his mentors, Smoot does not find modem media barons' and proved George Orwell wrong. 'The cosmology providing him with reasons for being scepti Bosnian Serbs can't hide their atrocities from the prob cal about a creator. Indeed the reverse is true. ing eyes of BBC, CNN and Sky news cameras; starva Wrinldes in Time, about to be published in Aus tion in Africa can no longer be ignored, because tralia by Penguin, is entertaining, honest, humorous and television brings it into our living rooms; the extraordi reverent. Smoot is not entirely accurate in his survey of nary living standards produced by free-enterprise capi the relations between cosmology and religion, but nei talism cannot be kept secret from a world that sees how ther is he dogmatic. There is an attractive, self-effacing Lucy lived, and how Bill Cosby's Dr Huxtable proposes goodnes and wonder here: for a scientist, Smoot copes in a supposedly fractured society.' • well with mystery. Good summer reading. • Mark Skulley is a freelance journalist. - Jolm Honner SJ V O LUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 19 REPORT DAVE LANE -r-.-- e thci' ~~ J~.;::::;c-• A cmo E~d~,,~ oili~~ ~'~ ?n~•gc:~ nc~o:d~ ~th '~d" Commission's attempt to break the paper now reaches about a quarter of ship. The first to go down this track newsagents' monopoly on the distri- Canberra's homes, a figure considered was one of the country's oldest rock bution of newspapers in Victoria (Eu- well below potential and one which music magazines, Juke, which, with a relw Street, August 1993) has been triggered the paper's decision to di- new format, is being sold through stalled by legal action, a similar chal- reedy employ delivery contractors. Brash's music shops. lenge by one of Australia's smaller Although Canberra newsagents have In Victoria, the Trade Practices daily papers is proving something of a now lost about 10 per cent of their Commission's ruling in July, which bonanza for the residents of the home delivery trade, store sales have was meant to begin the gradual dereg- nation's capital. remained static. Samaras says that ulationofthatstate'snewsagencysys- In September The Canberra Times sales in supermarkets and other new tem, has been suspended because of launched its own distribution net- outlets, which are now into their thou- legal moves to block the changes. The work, and Canberrans have since got sands, are boosting overall figures and challenges, in the form of appeals to their home-town daily delivered are the result of impulse buying. both the Trade Practices Tribunal and ~!'!~!~,.. cheaper and earlier. The number of ThismovebyTheCanberraTimes the Federal Court were not made by retail outlets has also been expanded, challenges the claim by newsagents Victorian newsagents, however, (the to include supermarkets and corner that they alone can get newspapers commission arm-twisted them into stores, and the paper offers retail out- and magazines to consumers most accepting its determination) but by lets better commissions than news- effectively and cheaply. It is this claim the Queensland Newsagents Federa- agents offer their subagents for high- which forms the basis of the newsa- tion. The federation is spearheading a volume sales. gency distribution monopoly through- campaign to maintain the monopoly Most of Canberra's newsagents out the country. The Trades Practices system throughout Australia. The tri- have reacted by taking legal action. Commission has, in the past, been bunal will look at the matter again They have appealed to the Federal prepared to accept this assertion of towards the end of November, and all Court over a retail sales agreement public benefit and endorse what would parties now await a ruling by the Fed- the paper now wants them to sign, otherwise be illegal restrictions on eral Court. claiming it is anti-competitive. They trade. The commission's determination have obtained an injunction to ensure The Canberra Times was able to has also been appealed against by con- that they continue to receive supplies break the monopoly because it is no venience-store groups and sub-news of The Canberra Times until a further longer owned by one of the big two agencies, which argue that the ruling hearing on 12 November. The NSW / publishers (Murdoch or Fairfax), who, does not go far enough towards dereg- ACT Newsagents Association has together with newsagency represent- ulation. They are also objecting to the kept its distanccfrom the court action, atives, nm the NSW /ACTNewsagen- Queensland Newsagents Federation however, preferring negotiations with cy Council. The Can berra daily intrusion. the paper. changed hands four years ago, and a The Queenslanders say that pub- Nick Samaras, the general manag- smaller media entrepreneur, Kerry lie benefit is the issue at stake. The er of The Canberra Times, compares Stokes,nowcontrolsthepaperthrough federation used the Freedom of Infer- his paper to daily staples like bread Federal Capital Press. marion Act to check on the Trade and milk, and that is where the news- The one other capital-city daily to Practices Commission's comments paper is now being placed-alongside break its links with the traditional register, and found there had been the basics of life at supermarkets or newsagency distribution system is The only 26 complaints about newsagents convenience stores. Night owls can West Australian. The Perth morning in four years. That, says the federa- pick up a copy at one of the city's five daily has been having a profitable run tion's chief executive, Ken Murphy, is 2A-hour supermarkets by 2am each since its resurrection from the ashes hardly sufficient evidence to claim day, and The Canberra Times will of the Bond empire nearly two years the system is not working well for all. supply any shop that can sell more ago and, like The Canberra Times, it While the commission is engaged than five copies of the paper a day. is not controlled by Murdoch or Fair- in protracted and expensive legal Readersarealsoenjoyingthebene- fax. The paper's publisher, WAN Ltd, debate, however, the newspaper buy- fits of a price war, as newsagents offer has quit the state's Newsagency Coun- ing public will have a chance to make 10 per cent discounts to counter the cil and in September it announced their own judgment, by watching the paper's promotion of hefty savings for that it would deal directly with shops ACT to see whether The Canberra home delivery. The Canberra Times and home-delivery contractors. Times continues to provide a cheaper, now comes with the promise not only Newsagents are also under pres- more convenient way to pick up the of arriving at the front door earlier- sure from another source, as some paper each morning. • by 6am-but also at a lower price. magazine publishers contemplate Discounts for home delivery range withdrawing titles from newsagents from21 percentto36.5percent below and selling through shops that con- Dave Lane is an ABC producer. 20 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMBER 1993 REPORT FRANK BRENNAN A Cool<'s tour fro1n Malo to Mabo T .BOAT RIDE FROM Thursday and even on T-shirts, while there was ed cut-off elate of December 1993 as Island to Bamaga on the tip of Cape never any mention of Passi or Rice. unacceptable elements of the Canber York can be rough. But on this last The public phone outside the com ra package. occasion, it was a pleasant trip early in munity store was my only contact The Aboriginal negotiators in Can the morning. The boat was powerful; with Canberra, whereMabo was play berra have had their ups and downs the skipper knew the reefs and cur ing itself out as if in another country. with Keating. The June proposal to rents. My travelling companion was The day's final irony was the realisa the premiers was described as a 'slimy David Passi, the Anglican pastor of tion that, according to the High Court document'. The September outline of the island community of Mer. He and judgment, native title to land where legislation was labelled 'putrid'. The James Rice were the two successful David Passi lives was extinguished Commonwealth's rationale of the litigants in the Mabo proceedings. last century. David lives in the church package was a dose of 'moral scurvy'. The bishop's plane having crashed house, on land first leased to the Lon Once there was agreement not to the day before, David and I had to don Missionary Society. Ten days lat 'suspend', 'roll back' or 'disapply' the organise an island hop to make it to er the Aboriginal negotiators com- Racial Discrimination Act, but rather the clergy conference, where land to roll up all the nasties contrary issues were the main agenda item. The Prime Minister did well, because toAboriginalinterests and to label Nearing the mainland, David them a special measure for the pointed, 'That's Possession unlike the Premiers he negotiated purposes of the Act, the Aborigi Island'. I replied, 'So that's where directly with Aborigines and spoke nal negotiators were prepared to Captain Cookstarteditall'. Cook for their interests as well as for the commit themselves to a negoti had sailed up the coast of the ated outcome. mainland and planted a flag on developers. Some premiers have They described that outcome this island, claiming all he had treated Aboriginal rights as if they as an historic decision, even sailed past in the name of his me contrary to theiJ: state's interest. though they secured only half the king. David, with a broad grin demands they had put as their agreed: 'Yes, but he had his back bottom line ten days before. They to Torres Strait when he did it.' pleted a midnight deal with the Prime did well, having achieved all that was That day, David explained the Minister in Canberra. I took off for achievable from a pro-development Mabo case to his fellow islander cler Western Australia, which, as that Cabinet anxious about federal-state gy. Holding up his arms, he described state's Premier, Richard Court, says relations. The Prime Minister did well, the two laws: 'One says 'Might is 'is special'-it is the state where Mabo because unlike the Premiers he nego right'; the other, which is Malo's law has greatest practical significance. tiated directly with Aborigines and [the traditional law of the Mer com Canberra was just as remote for these spoke for their interests as well as for munity], says 'This is our land be people at the opposite end of Australia the developers. Some premiers have cause it was given us and our ances from the Torres Strait. Everyone was treated Aboriginal rights as if they are tors by God.' We have to educate the talking about Mabo. Keating's Mabo contrary to their state's interest. people of the first law that tllis second package will only pass the Senate if he The test of Keating and the Abo law is right. We have won half the wins the support of the WA Greens. riginal negotiators will be the accept case. We have got the land. But the The latter, presumably, will beatleast ance of their package by the Greens other law still has not recognised our as responsive to the wishes of WA and Aboriginal groups of Western right to the sea.' The previous day on Aboriginal groups as they were to the Australia. Keating put his authority Mer, James Rice had driven me around wishes of Margaret River wine grow on the line with his Cabinet to win the village in a beach buggy. 'Have you ers during the wine-tax dispute. endorsement for the package. The always livedhere?''Thisis my island,' W A Aboriginal leaders like Robert Aboriginal negotiators risked their he said, 'this is my destination.' Bropho will oppose any legislation, political futures with a volatile con Meanwhile in Canberra, Aborigi because Mabo does not address the stituency just by coming to the table. nal negotiators and the Prime Minis needs of fringe dwellers and it con They now await judgment from the ter had fallen out with each other. firms the extinguishment of native West. Meanwhile the islanders are Mabo was a mess. The Murray Island title on areas like the Swan Brewery speaking of autonomy behind Cook's ers were oblivious to the mainland site. Others, like Rob Riley from the back, confident that Malo's law is machinations. They had two concerns: Aboriginal Legal Service of WA, will strong enough to bring that other law uninvited fishermen invading their be wary of any Commonwealth legis into line. • waters and the constant television lation that leaves too much to the references to 'Mabo' depicting the discretion of Richard Court. Rob Riley Frank Brennan SJ is a visiting fellow wrong flag. In passing, one of Eddie has already identified the legislative in the law program at the Research Mabo's nephews expressed embarrass extinguishment of native title on val School of Social Sciences, Australian ment that his name was always on TV idated pastoral leases and the extend- National University. VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 21 THE N ATION MICHAEL M cKERNAN What Australians remember E ACH m TH' "" "'~"ONS of the fi,st Aust,.Jian only been seen by a handful of Australians. Bellenglise Imperial Force built a memorial after the First World was the last site visited in August and September by War, to commemorate mates who had been killed and 'Australians on the Western Front', a commemorative to recall the high point of the division's fighting. Four mission of 14 First World War veterans, seven war wid of these memorials are in France and one is in Belgium; ows and their caravan of helpers. It was thought too four are simple stone obelisks, one is a statue. difficult to take the party's buses to Bellenglise, so most The statue is on a main road, between Peronne and of them- and most of the media- missed this final act Bapaume, but the others are at out-of-the-way places. of commemoration. The most remote is the 4th Divison memorial, near the I had been asked to provide an historical commen tiny French village of Bellenglise. The Australian obe tary at all the sites we visited, but at Bellenglise there lisk stands on a high point of no beauty, drama or appar was a private commemoration to be done as well as a ent military consequence, in the midst of fields. A public one: I had two great uncles who served in the 4th six-lane motorway, out of sight but less than 100 me Division, in the 14th battalion ('Jacka's Mob'). Both were tres away, provides a constant mmble of traffic. I do not killed in the fighting at Hamel in 1918. know what was unearthed when roadmakers dug deep This commemoration business is a curious thing. I into the soil to build the motorway, but when workers had not previously visited an uncle or aunt's grave, and, built the TGV train line through the Somme valley, not with neither the time nor much inclination for family so very far away, they carted 100,000 tonnes of metal. history, I do not even know with complete accuracy The train line is certainly narrower than the motorway. how many great aunts or great uncles I possess. Such is A farmer at Bullecourt, home of the Australian Memo the record-keeping of modern warfare, however, that rial Park, told me that he had begun to dig up a tank, anyone with an hour or so to spare may learn some buried for more than 75 years. thing of death at the front. The 4th Division fought in all the major battles on Claude Thomas enlisted in August 1915 but only the western front in which Australians took part, and transferred to the 14th battalion much later, to be with by 1917 its members had earned a reputation as shock his brother. A mate who had worked with him in the troops. Charles Bean wrote that the division had 'the Service Corps tried to talk him out of joining the infan least polish but the most numerous battle scars'. At Bul try, without success. In July 1918 he was in the trench lecourt, on 11 April1917, the division lost two-thirds of es at Hamel as the opposing artillery began 'duelling', the men who entered the fight, but by the Battle of as military historians would put it. A piece of shrapnel Hamel in July 1918 the division had begun to record hit the parapet in front of him and glanced off, striking some victories on its list of battle honours. It was near his cartridge pouch. Five cartridges exploded, killing him Bellcnglisc, assaulting the Hindenburg Line in Septem instantly. He was buried behind the trench the next day. ber 1918, that the division recorded its last victory Claude's brother, Clan)' (curiously, the priest who against the Germans. There was sense in placing the taught me Latin at school always called me 'Clarence'), memorial at that remote spot, even if probably it has was kept out of the line after that, at least for a while. 22 EUREKA STREET • N ovEMBER 1993 But, as the chaplain, Frank Rolland (the first Australian The veterans themselves certainly give the organ clergyman to be knighted), later put it: 'the absence of isers a 'marketing edge'. Even Australians esteem grand reinforcements owing to the failure of conscription' old age, and part of the charm of the thing is simply the made it necessary to put in eve1y man who was able to capacity of these ve1y old men to keep on going. In Tur fight. In that letter of condolence to grieving parents is key, three years ago, young Australians backpacked all evidence of the awful social, political and religious divi over the peninsula in the hope of meeting some of the sion that the war caused in Australia. Clarry was killed heroes. I have a beautiful series of photos of some of at Morlancourt, 34 days after the death of his brother; a these encounters, which clearly illustrate the mood of piece of shell hit him in the neck and he died instantly. reverence the old men arouse. There were far fewer back I was the first of the family to see either man's grave. packers in France and Belgium because, for Australians, They, and thousands of others, are commemorated by the western front seems to have far less drawing power. the obelisk at Bellenglise. The organisers clearly hoped that media attention There was much pomp and ceremony during the would encourage greater Australian interest in the west week of the commemorative mission, particularly at ern front, and that the recital of Australian disasters and those events that the Governor-General attended. He triumphs would trigger greater interest. Military hist must be formally welcomed and farewelled with the ory occupies an odd place in Australia at 'vice-regal salute', and the tour leader, the Veterans present. When the Governor-General Affairs Minister, John Faulkner, and the chief of the allowed himself to use colloquial invec It could be argued general staff, Lieutenant-General John Grey, were also tive in describing the British high com accorded their own protocol. We had taken along an Aus mand (Haig was a 'knucklehead'), he was that only on the tralian band and guard of honour to provide these and castigated by some media commentators. western front has other services, so at times we were very grand indeed. He must have been pleased with the ex The French seemed anxious at least to match the Aus traordinarily strong support in an Aus military action by tralian military presence, and often we had two bands tralian editorial. The writer used the to listen to and the Governor-General had two guards Governor-General's comments to claim Australians ever to inspect. There was also, naturally, a contingent of the right for all Australians to elaborate French officials to match the Australian contingent. their version of the past. It is unusual for affected the course In all this formality, it might have been possible to historical matters to arouse such passions lose the meaning of the mission. What moves a govern and notoriety, and Australian historians of world history. ment to send men and women who are well beyond rarely gain the attention of the main their 90th year, on an arduous journey, halfway round stream media except in moments of high Commonly we play the world? We may assume that the travel is hazardous, academic bitchiness. The organisers and certainly it is costly. So far as I know, no other nation should have rejoiced that the mission in the reserves, but despatches its citizens on such journeys; indeed, the was, at least, noticed. French have recently cancelled a commemorative For it is their view, I think, that what for a few months activity in Paris on 11 November, as if through Australians endured and achieved on the lack of interest. western front was formative in the de in 1918 Australians velopment of Australia. It could be ar were in the main So WHAT DRrvEs AusTRAUANS to do these things? In gued that only on the western front has part, there is a promotional purpose. Despite the per military action by Australians ever affect ceptions about Anzac and all that it means, Australian ed the course of world histmy. Common league. military history now appears to be unknown among all ly we play in the reserves, but for a few but a handful of people, usually with a personal or fam months in 1918 Australians were in the main league. ily interest. Watching an Anzac Day march in the 1950s The AIF paid a terrible price for its prominent role, of or '60s was an exercise in folk memory. The arrival of course, and the destruction of so much that was good in each battalion would set people in the crowd talking, national life urges some to keep its memory green. For accurately and in detail, about the places of service, the a little while, what Australians did mattered. That is achievements and the losses. Today, only well-briefed important for those who want to draw attention to the television commentators can come up with the same Australian stmy today. amount of information. Places that were once house It was at the smaller commemorations, at the divi hold names-Fromelles, Pozieres, Passchendaele-are sional memorials or at mlique battlefields like Fromelles now unknown to those grappling with Mabo, there or Mont St Quentin, that this side of the mission had public and Sydney 2000. Sandy Stone may have ensured the best chance of exposure. At the larger ceremonies, permanent recognition for Gallipoli Crescent, but does the old men and women were wamped and diminished. anyone in Hampton, where I once lived, twig to the National life had swept by them, and although all the meaning of Imbros, Lagnicourt and Hamel streets? The speeches attempted to put them at centre-stage, it was military-history 'true believers' cannot understand this, the Governor-General or the French minister who dom and seek to use the services of the few survivors to bring inated. But at Bullecourt, where the Australians suffered the nation to a better state of mind. a terrible thrashing, the entire village turned out to cele- VoLUME 3 NuMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 23 To an unknown Japanese soldier Konnichiwa! Wherever you are, brate the Australian veterans, emotion took over. There My own unknown soldier. French children laid individually fashioned wreaths and You who those many years ago sang, with spirit, a Gallic version of Advance Australia (For the honour of your Emperor) Fair. At Mont St Quentin, memory of the risk of the Shot the brother I loved. Australian assault so overwhelmed a veteran that in a soldierly way and early in the morning, he needed a Had your bullets missed or merely winged him strong drink to steady himself. And at Bcllenglise, words He would, God willing, have been eighty today, seemed futile when set against the fact of an exploding And being twins we would have had a modest dinner together cartridge pouch from which there could be no protec (Spare ribs were our favourite dish) tion. With a selected bottle of red Australians do have a past, as they now stridently Which afterwards would have been emptied leisurely assert. For some, the past is best found in personal rath Over a game of chess. er than national stories. The meaning of Vietnam is not But he is dead, found only in the diplomatic histories, or the detailed So I boil an egg and play against a computer instead, analysis of a b You did it so neatly, like a parlour trick, Michael McKernan is deputy director of the Au tralian Just a twitch of the finger War Memorial. And he stopped as if shocked Then slowly twisted into a heap to lie Curled like a foetus in some woman's womb. YOUTH Did you cry 'Banzai' or 'Long Live Nippon'! Did you nod with profe sional pleasure HOMELESSNESS Or feel an instinctive flicker of regret! Courage and Hope Sometimes I wonde1· if you're still alive, Or did you, too, die for an idea edited by Helen Sykes That had it roots in some ancient fear or hate! Any book on homeless youth will be disturbing Do sons and daughters dutifully mourn on appropriate occasions and rightly so-but this book also brings us hope And teach their children the sort of lore and admiration- both for the school programs it That you and my brother died for! describes and for the young people, whose courage is remarkable Anne Deveson This morning, at the supa-market bottle shop, I bought a cask of unobjectionable red Youth Homelessness tells the And a small flasl< of sake, stories of homeless young And when my frugal evening meal is eaten people and of people who I hall drink to you both. have tried to help them. Then, ignoring the computer, It is a moving account of a Will sit by an open window and watch the moon problem which is literally While composing a salute to my brother and you on our doorsteps. As you cross the vast emptiness of death together With no remembrance of the moment which linked you forever In a sinister innocence, victim and killer. RRP $24.95 Paperback 176 pp Now available at all bookshops Silly, isn't iU Melboun1e University Press r.&tJ Sayona1·a, wherever you are. Phone (03)347 3455 Fax (03)349 2527 \.!] Maslyn Williams REPORT: 2 JoN GREENAWAY Conventional solutions Australia's Constitution is notoriously difficult to change; the Constitutional Centenary Foundation believes a convention is the best way to tackle the process. I N 1897-98 THE N ATIONAL AUSTRALASIAN CONVENTION also be represented. It is hoped that legislation creating sat to discuss whether the colonies should form a feder- a constitutional convention would be enacted in 1995- ation of states. Delegates were elected by New South 96, so that the convention could sit in 1997-98-appro- Wales, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania, and a priately, 100 years after its ancestor. party of parliamentary members attended from West- Tracey and his foundation believe that the inclu- ern Australia. Queensland did not take part. The pro- sion of non-politicians is vital to the success of the pro- posal arising from the convention was put to the public posed convention. In the 1970s a body was established in the four states that had elected delegates, and was by the Whitlam government to review the Constitu- passed in all except New South Wales. Reservations in tion. Members were drawn from Commonwealth, state that state concerning the nature of the draft legislation and local governments, producing material that achieved resulted in the threshold number of votes being raised very little. In 1987-88 the Constitutional Commission, and subsequently not reached. Following negotiations headed by Sir Maurice Byers, produced a report that at a premiers' conference, the motion was passed at a Tracey lauds; however, none of the four questions aris- second referendum. Soon after, Queensland voted to join ing from it was passed in the following referendum. He and later so too did Western Australia, virtually as the argues that a convention that broadly represented the ink from Queen Victoria's pen was drying. community would have a better The executive director of the Constitutional Cen- chance of achieving its objectives tenary Foundation, Denis Tracey, regards federation as because 'people are going to be one of the great events in Australia's history. The foun- more inclined to trust an organi- dation was formed two years ago to commemorate this sation ... in which they had a bit achievement and to encourage debate on constitutional more involvement and input'. change. To foster the process of examination and debate, The foundation's proposals the foundation has suggested that a forum be established are very much in their infancy. along the lines of the national convention. Tracey is How delegates would be appoint- actively non-partisan and believes the foLmdation's most ed, what the terms of reference notable success in two years is in not having offended would be and how the process anyone. The organisation wants to promote informed should be conducted are questions debate in place of argument about preconceived ideas. yet to be answered. These will As the name suggests the fmmdation is concerned with have to be clarified if the govern- the Constitution as a whole and its charter extends mentis to consider the plan at all, beyond the Republic and Mabo. Some of the issues they especially since the Senate has wish to promote are: a four-year term for the House of shown a tendency to be unco- Representatives, the independence of the judiciary, and operative. Nevertheless, the prec- a bill of rights. edence of the 1890s convention will lend momentum Almost in spite of this, cutting ties with the mon- to their cause, as will the support given by the chair- archy and the reconciliation of Aboriginal and white man of the Republic Advisory Committee, Malcolm Australians will inevitably be at the heart of any plan Turnbull. Such a forum has the potential to provide for constitutional review. If legislation is passed to ena- much towards public discussion; the question is whether ble a convention, the manner in which constitutional it can navigate through the political turbulence with reform is debated will be just as crucial to its success as the skill of its predecessor in the 1890s. the nature of the proposed changes themselves. If there Even if Australia wakes up on New Year's Day 2001 is continued conflict between the parties on these two with the Constitution unaltered, the Constitutional issues, it is unlikely that other initiatives will attract Centenary Foundation would be content if there is a the attention of the public gaze. Tracey believes that greater awareness of how we are governed. According bipartisan participation is the only way to prevent de- to Denis Tracey this will depend on how the issues are bate at a convention from becoming irrelevant. presented to the public-'The media would have a key The foundation proposes a convention of about 100 role in popularising without trivialisir:.g the process; you delegates. Along with politicians, both past and present, need to come up with all sorts of imaginative strategies would be a significant number from other sectors of the to make this accessible to the people out in the suburbs.' community, drawn from each of the states and territo- • ries. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups would Jon Greenaway is a freelance journalist. V O LUME 3 NUMilER 9 • EUREKA STREET 25 INTERVIEW M ORAC fRASER Losing the thoughtlines N NW Mm"c " CoomAN, summer grasses and from Zadar on the Dalmatian coa t. squints into a benevolent He describes his home town fondly: sun. Nenad Miscevic 'A bea utiful place, with monuments Zadar exemplifies the subtle 26 EUREKA STREET • NovEMBER 1993 mythology of virility. Now that the strations-give us back our sons etc. to international discussion. One jour boys are becoming important, the girls Then PresidentTudjman made a com nal subscription can leaven the mo are becoming less important.' plimentarycomment. He said that it's rale of a whole department. Oddly, Religious life for women in Croatia very good that they arc ge tting their mail is uncensored. had been changing before the war, sons out of the Yugoslav army. We Then there is polit with their active participation not only need them for the Croatian army.' ical support. He is vety 'What you get now religious life but in administration I asked about the allegiances of the specific about the kind and teaching. I asked Nenad what has women who went on the catnpaign. 'It that is helpful, and very is a very rightwing, happened now. He registers embar was very different for different moth much the assertive pa rassment, talking to someone from a ers. There were some who would ob triot in his analysis: 'It very primitive Catholic journaL Go on, I prod. 'Well, ject to their son serving in any army, is very important that what you get now is a very rightwing, some who were afraid of their sons the West support dem Catholicism very primitive Catholicism becoming going into civil war, and some who ocratic tendencies with dominant. This puts women ideolog were enthusiastic about taking them in Croatia. Very often becoming ically in a very bad position. A di from the Serbian army and putting western institutions vorced woman in certain regions is them in the Croatian army.' condemn the Croatian dominant. This already quite problematic.' Along with certainty, information govemment and then, I wonder aloud how much ecclesi is in short supply now, because of the ipso facto, all of Croatia. puts women astical support the new conservatism war. And corruption within the gov This is killing us. It has. He is happier with political than ernment has eroded national purpose: means that if you criti ideologically in a with church-political analysis: 'I 'People who were ready to sacrifice cise your govcrnn1ent wouldn't know. I know that our bish their material well-being for the war, then you are seen as very bad position. ops and cardinal are very reserved in for the defence of their country, have being on the side of the their pronouncements. But the fact is become bitterly disappointed. The enemy. A divorced woman that tllis is in the air. Feminism was freedom of the press was first serious 'It should be made traditionally associated with leftist ly infringed and is now reduced.' clear that Croatians are in certain regions is movements and so it is now seen as Again, the ironies of history: 'In victims in the war, that part of the communist movement.' the communist regime, all the news we are on the right side, already quite The conversation is becoming papers were state-owned. When the but with the bad luck of clear-cut. From here it is easy to dis communist regime was weakened, the having a rightwing to proble1natic.' cern villains, plot the shifts, the rever joumals and television had become talitarian gove1nment.' sions, the inevitable patterns of war. practically independent, though theo And Serbia? What potential docs Maybe because of the morning air. Or retically still state-owned. Now the he see for internal democratic dissens the long view. From where we are state has simply taken back the whole ion there? 'I think the potential is very sitting you can gaze clear across the thing. People are very poor now, so the smalL It seems that the condition of valley to a rural cameo. A silent trac main sources of information are radio intellectual survival there is to be tor inches its way up a slope and com and television, and they are super con lieve that everyone is equally guilty in slides into moire patterns formist, super authoritarian.' this war. So there will be no free move behind it. A flutter of applause from an up ment of thought for a very long time to stairs window greets the end of a paper come. When I meet my Serbian col EARLIER, WALKING Ul' through the on the philosophy of mind. People leagues abroad-the only opportunity spruce village to meet Nenad I stopped from the Gy1ru1asium behind us spill we get now to talk-we have come to to spell my way through Kirchberg's out on to the grass, arguing brightly. the point of trying not to talk about history, hammered in copper on a 'What hope is there for you, for think the war. I regret their blindness, but plaque in the town square. Since 1216 ers, for your country?' I ask him. 'The on the other hand I respect their strug this tiny paradise has seen plague, only hope for us is that the war ends gle for democracy. So we talk about Turkish invasion, famine, French soon.' old times.' wars, floods ('Hochwasserkatastroph And when is that likely to be? This time we don't laugh. I tell en' they are called), ecclesiastical divi 'This I don't know; no one knows. But Nenad it is hard for a non-Aboriginal sion, lightning strikes and Russian I'm sure when the war ends that Australian to understand Ius world, to occupation. Croatia will find back its liberal face, countenance the inevitability of Up on the hill we laugh again. its long-standing liberal tradition.' I bloody conflict on our own soiL He ThenNenad tells a terrible story, about tell him he is more sanguine than I looks at me quizzically and says, 'It what he calls 'the whole thing'. 'A few would be. But what choice has he? must be a very boring place, this coun years ago, the patriotic Croatian lead For N enad Miscevic and many like try of yours.' • ers orgatlised a movement to get their him in ex-Yugoslavia, ideas are a life kids out of the Yugoslav army. It was line. The West can help by providing Morag Fraser is the editor of Eureka called the Bulwark of Love and it gained places for students in universities out Street. great support in Croatia. They were side the war zone, by providing the The text of her interview with N enad travelling around from one military raw material of ideas. Scholars need Miscevic was transcribed by Jon object to another and making demon- journals. They need access to papers, Greenaway. VOLUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 27 ESSAY P ET ER STEELE Passages of arms GOING TO SEE A MORTALLY ILL FRIEND IN HOSPffAL, I passed Napoleon's Mili tary Bookshop, and remembered dejectedly an old thought-that war is a way of finding a use for that otherwise useless thing, death. A couple of days pre viously I had heard an authority on the dangerous little upstart describe him as 'a warlord-he liked to make war on people'. Quite so, I thought: and the world should be in other hands. But when I put my nose into the bookshop, the second book I saw was Women Wm·lords, and I thought that I could do better at the hospital. My friend died that night, and I am in no hurry to get back to Napoleon's. If I wished to do so, I would have readier access there than I would to the oddly titled adult bookshops a block or so away. Bylaws shield us from some of the prancings of the sexual appetite, lest Venus flood our streets. Napoleonic fer vours, by contrast, which stain maps red with our own precious rivers, are there to be enthused about by man, woman, or child. Hatred's incontinence is big magic. L ,s rs SrR THOMAS NORTH, rendering Plutarch's Life of Julius Ca esar, which looms behind Shake speare's play: Then this soldier, being the hindmost man of all the captains, marching with great pain through the mire and dirt, half-swimming and half afoot, in the end got to the other side; but left his shield behind him. Caesar, wondering at his noble courage, ran with joy to embrace him. But the poor soldier, hanging down his head, the water standing in his eyes, fell down at Caesar's feet and besought him to pardon him, for that he had left his target behind him. And in Afric also Scipio having taken one of Caesar's ships, and Gra nius Petroni us aboard on her amongst other, not long before chosen Treasurer, he put all the rest to the sword but him, and said he would give him his life. But Petronius an swered him again; that Caesar's soldiers did not use to have their lives given them, but to give others their lives; and with those words he drew his sword and thmst himself through. This i celebrity writing-writing up The Great Soldier himself, decorating the anonymous footslogger, aggranclising the pride of Petronius, and carrying the whole business across into phrases which are cadenced against one another with the smoothness of long-practised drill movements. Shakespeare himself might have been pleased with the ambiguity of 'the water standing in his eyes', and may have been echoing the spirit of the last sentence at more than one point in his own Juliu s Caesar. North writes like a man who believes that elevation is called for when the matter of war is at issue. Translating violence into prose, he transfigures it. 28 EUREKA STREET • N OVEM ilER 1993 There is more at issue here than the adulation of about his grappling with it. As lived war presents inces After torture, the blind lead violence which makes possible much of the 'R'-rating sant moral challenges to those engaged in it, represent the mad: Ian Scott as industry. We are in fact close to that mystery whereby ed war presents incessant imaginative and linguistic Gloucester and David something good is recurrently plucked out of the heart challenges. Shakespearean military eloquence is a proc Roberts as Edgar (Poor of evil. Shakespeare, often a trafficker in accounts of ess of trying to meet these last. Tom). King Lear, Act IV lethal violence, succeeds almost as often in delineating 'War writing' may have the accent on the first word these things handsomely and movingly. He is rarely or or on the second, and the difference is not slight. David giastic in the way he handles war or war-makers. Henry Jones, whose In Parenthesis is the one indisputable Eng V's 'Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;/ lish masterpiece to come out of the First World War, Or close the war up with our English dead' is a model of was to write later, in a piece called 'Art in Relation to soldierly eloquence-the pep talk as high art-but it is War', far from the last word on the conduct of what Othello, elsewhere, calls 'the plumed troop and the big wars/ That Not only the Preface for Christmas, not only Nor make ambition virtue.' man vaulting, not only Piero della Francesca 's Na War, for Shakespeare, is in part a craft, something tivity, but Rommel's desert tactic and Nelson's instrumental, the pursuit of power by the most drastic Nile touch, are empty of all significance-"they of means. Sometimes it is inane: often it is hubristic: need not have bothered", unless fom1 is good in Photos pp28-31 tal V oLUME 3 NuMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 29 Jones never got the stink of the trenches out of his nostrils, but he also never stopped trying to rear out of the mud something emblematic of human goodness. That is Shakespeare's instinct, and some of it clings to North's Plutarch. A utres temps, autres moeurs. This is Randall Jar rell, of all too many occasions in our own times: There set out, slowly, for a Different World, At four, on winter mornings, different legs ... You can't break eggs without making an omelette - That's what they tell the eggs. Jarrell too knows what he is doing. He wrote many poems about the Second World War- nobody calls it the Second Great War, thank God- and they range in RIGHT-F ragile perspective from 'The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner' peace: Cordelia through 'Mail Call' to 'The Survivor Among Graves.' (Melita furisic) The four lines above are the whole of 'A War', and they King Lear, Act IV. are full of the astringency which contempt brings to cant. BELOW-Kingship What helped to hurt Jarrell about that war was not only and dignity in the Lenin-like adducing of any old means to serve the exile: Lear (Carrillo good old end, but the unwarranted assumption that the Gantner) and Poor end would be secured at all. 'We become the thing we Tom (David fight', Orwell wrote: Jarrell was haunted by the night Roberts). Act III. mare of just such a futility. Jarrell's bitter little verse might be thought of as a counter-incantation, a dismantling of those verbal en chantments whereby our race seduces itself towards self destruction. War-chants, ritualized boasts, patriotic hortations, propaganda's shrillings, 'I could not love thee (Dear) so much) Lov'd I not Honour more'-such things have been in possession of the instinctive conscious ness for as long as we have had human records. They are not to be dislodged by even the best of arguments, it would seem . But at least they can be defaced, from time to time. In earlier times, a device much in use against cav alry was the caltrop-an iron ball with four protruding spikes so arranged that when the ball is on the ground one of them always points upwards. Verse like Jarrell's is a kind of intellectual and imaginative caltrop: it brings the rushing or hustling mind to a halt. This is one of the typical uses of satirical writing. Most of us have bus tling minds, 'getting over the ground as lightly as possi ble' as one celebrated general described his aim, and dogmatic or propagandistic utterances play upon this fact. Persuaders, hidden or open, put most of their ef forts into consolidating and intensifying present con victions, so that the 'obvious' is back-lit into vividness. But it is possible to adopt a different policy. The poet Juan Ramon Jimenez scribbled in a notebook, 'If they give you lined paper, write the other way', and Jarrell is At dawn I awoke, and what I saw all around were numerous objects I'd miraculously not tripped over in the dark. These objects were dozens of dead German boys in greenish-gray uniforms, killed a day or two before by the company we were relieving. If darkness had hidden them from us, dawn disclosed them with open eyes and greenish-white faces like marble, still clutching their rifles and machine pistols in their 17-year old hands, fixed where they had fallen. (For the first time I understood the German phrase for the war dead: die Gefallenen.) Michelangelo could have made something beautiful out of these forms, in the Dying Gaul tradition, and I was startled to find that at first, in a way I couldn't understand, they struck me as beauti ful. But after a moment, no feeling but shock and horror. My adolescent illusions, largely in tact to that moment, fell away all at once, and I suddenly knew I was not and never would be in a world that was reasonable or just. The scene was less apocalyptic than shabbily ironic: it sort ed so ill with modem popular assumptions about the idea of progress and attendant improvements in public health, social welfare, and social jus tice. To transform guiltless boys into cold mar ble after passing them through unbearable fear and humiliation and pain and contempt seemed to do them an interesting injustice. I decided to ponder these things. One of Fussell's aids to pondering these things writing the other way. Somebody said that universities is the recollected Dying Gaul. David Jones, in 1959, re bring out all capacities in people, including the capaci calls being trained, 50 years before, to draw the Dying ty for stupidity; war can bring out all capacities, includ Gaul by gazing at' a plaster cast of a Roman marble copy ing that for intellectual alacrity. of a Greek bronze ... erected at Pergamon by an ally of Rome, King Attalos I, to celebrate his victory over groups of Celts operating in Asia Minor in the third century BC-the forefathers of Paul's "bewitched" Galatians'. JAORECC' S GENERATION OF "'""CANS .t W" pwduced That density of reference is not in Fussell's mind as he many writers, whether in poetry or in prose. Paul Fus makes his allusion, but to bring in Michelangelo, and sell was one of them. At the age of 20, on 11 November the monumentalising 'die Gefallenen', tends to knit 1944, he led 40 riflemen into a night relief in Alsace. He 'these objects', the dead boys, back into cultural memo recalls: ry just when they have been expelled by humanity from humanity. We and the company we were replacing were clev The original Dying Gaul, regarded from above, is erly and severely shelled; it was as if the Germans collapsing upon the oval war-shield which thus frames a few hundred feet away could see us in the dark him: the artefact does him a last service by helping to and through the thick pine growth. When the shell carry him over into art. Similarly, Fussell's play upon ing finally stopped, at about midnight, we realised 'greenish-gray unifonns' and 'greenish-white faces like that although near the place we were supposed to marble' is a reminder that careful characterisation of be, until daylight we were hopelessly lost. The any event 'others' it to a degree, and to a welcomed de order came to stop where we were, lie down among gree. But his second-last sentence, with the eloquent the trees, and get some sleep. We would finish the understatement of its final words, signals that it is a relief at first light. Scattered over several hundred bestial, a dehumanising 'othering' that has previously yards, the 250 of us in F Company lay down in a been visited upon the killed soldiers. Montaigne speaks darkness so thick we could see nothing at all. De of 'an art that wrestles against the art' in writing. Fus spite the terror of our first shelling (and several sell, for all his careful calm, wishes to display outrage people had been hit), we slept as soundly as babes. from the heart of his own saying. VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 31 'I decided to ponder the e things' is much of a piece emy is too strong and sometimes because he is with Augustine's, 'I became a great puzzle to myself', too weak. Sometimes our neighbors want the and th first points, as the second did, to a lifetime's things which we have or have the things which reflection and writing on embattled humanity. Fussell we want, and we both fight till they take ours or has written much not only on the wars of this centmy, give us theirs. It is a very justifiable cause of war but on the torsions of 18th-century literature, thought to invade a country after the people have been and feeling. Perhaps he found these last matters con wasted by famine, destroyed by pestilence, or em genial because that is the great period of satirical writ broiled by factions among themselves. It is justifi ing in English, but he is also particularly good at able to enter into a war against our nearest ally identifying the instinct for tragedy in such writers as when one of his towns lies convenient for us or a Swift and Johnson. That we should, so commonly, and territory of land that would render our dominions apparently so unalterably, behave in dysfunctional fa sh round and compact. If a prince send forces into a ion, beating the ploughshares of life into the blades of nation where the people are poor and ignorant, he death, and that this so frequently and spontaneously may lawfully put half of them to dea th and make wins enthusiasm, argues not just a blundering spirit but slaves of the rest in order to civilisc and reduce a self-annulling one. them from their barbarous way of living. It is a It is as if war provides, under its own special labo very kingly, honourable, and frequent practice ratory conditions, experiments in human bizarrerie. when one prince desires the assistance of another Everybody knows that som e things can be learned from to secure him against an invasion that the assist war- for instance, various surgical techniques-and ant, when he hath driven out the invader, should some things about war-for instance, the lessons that seize on the dominions himself and kill, impris pack the libraries of staff colleges. But it is harder to say on, or banish the prince he came to relieve. Alli whether, under its tutelage, we learn much about hu ance by blood or marriage is a sufficient cause of man nature at large. You would think that we would, war between princes; and the nearer the kindred but we do not seem to do so. There are plenty of apen;:us is, the greater is their disposition to quarrel. Poor to be had- Hiram Johnson's 'The first casualty when nations are hungty, and rich nations arc proud; and war com es is tmth', Sherman's 'War is all hell'- but pride and hunger will ever be at variance. For these something impedes their being taken to heart. They have reasons, the trade of a soldier is held the m ost hon the status of slogans rather than the authority of insights. ourable of all others, because a soldier is a Yahoo American soldiers in Vietnam referred to America as hired to kill in cold blood as many of his own 'the world', and things learned out of the world may be species, who have never offended him, as possibly lost, to the world's loss. 'Why tllis is hell, nor am I out he can. of it', says Marlowe's Mephistophilis, and he is talking about being among toutle monde. Swift's own epitaph, in St Patrick's, Dublin, says that he has gone where savage indignation can no long er tear his breast. Wherever that may be, it is possible /COURAGE, GARRULOUSNESS AND T H E MOB are on our that be misses the indignation. Celebration and denun side. What m ore do we want?' wrote Georg Christoph ciation arc his two preferred intellectual mode , and the Li chtenberg, in the late 18th century: and, 'A handful of econd ha the edge. In the present passage, he is hag soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments'. ridden by the sense that war is a m oral botch disguised That century had any number of field marshals' batons as reasonable behaviour. Swift's contemporaties invoked in its knapsacks, inherited from the preceding centu 'Reason' as though it were in tmth a divinity, and an ries. Life-as-warfare could easily be translated, in the immanent divinity at that. By contrast, he thought most milieu of public enthusiasm, into warfare-as-life, and of humanity foolish at best, and frequently knavish off the legs went again, at four or any other hour. Civil and never m ore so than when given to war. But when it war, international war, revolution and counter-revolu comes to soldiership, it takes one to know one. tion- they had a currency which was as mysterious a The oldest of wargames is chess, and the piece from thing as commercial currency can be, waxing and wan Gulliver's Travels has both the strategic and the tacti ing under influences which were both obscure and only cal air of good chess. The combination of trenchancy partly governable. This brought out the satirists, Swift and elegance which mns through the prose is the sort of am ong them. Here he is, mouthing through Gulliver, thing called for on the black-and-white board. The con his mug's mug: trolled redundancy of 'sometimes ... sometimes ... som e times ... som etimes' swells through the tally of 'good' Sometimes the quarrel between two princes is to occasions for warmaking. Paradox as commonplace decide which of them shall di possess a third of takes its place in this calculus of the crazcd-'the near his dominions, where neither of them pretend to er the kindred is, the grea ter is their disposition to quar any right. Som etimes one prince quarrelcth with rel'. 'Poor nations ... variance' tightens the whole into another for fear the other should quarrel with him. epigra m: and the final sentence, heard as outrage, is fac Sometimes a war is entered upon because the en- tually accurate about, say, standard training in the Ro- 32 EUREKA STREET • N ovEMilER 1993 man army. If it is said that this way of writing is car Soldier who, hovering 'there', sends signals of serenity toon-like and hence not to be taken seriously, Swift's to a particular American. This is fantasy, but as Mer retort would no doubt be that in war we rapidly make win casts it, haunting fantasy. grotesques of ourselves. And if it is replied that this does It takes its force partly from the fact that Pierre's not happen to every person, every time, then he would recitative-'he says ... he says ...'-is in the voice of the challenge us to be confident that no such deformation dead, though from one who does not know that he is would be visited upon us or embraced by us. Thoreau dead. The brunt of much prophetic saying in the Old wrote that it is a property of wisdom not to do desperate Testament, as in the New, is that people are walking things: Swift thought war a desperate thing, and if it is dead: Merwin, here as elsewhere, is trying to haunt the also the 'last reason of kings', so much the worse for the morally or spiritually dead into life. However, unlike kings, not to speak of the rest of us. his father, he is not a professional preacher, and his de vices are obliquity, evocation, and provocation, rather than proclamation. The 'still, small voice' is his pre I N 1970, W.S . MERWlN PU13LISHED a bookful of short prose ferred idiom, and an arrival of words, as plain and strange pieces. One of them is called 'Postcards from the Maginot as that of his imagined postcards, his chosen mode. But Line', and these are the first and last of its four para he does not think that we have nothing to fear. graphs: This morning there was another one in the mail. EoM TIM O'BRIEN's The Things They Carried: A slightly blurred and clumsily retouched shot of some of the fortifications, massive and scarcely They carried USO stationery and pencils and pens. protruding from the enormous embankments. The They carried Sterno, safety pins, trip flares, signal guns-the few that can be seen-look silly, like flares, spools of wire, razor blades, chewing tobac wax cigars. The flag looks like a lead soldier's, with co, liberated joss sticks and statuettes of the smil the paint put on badly. The whole thing might be ing Buddha, candles, grease pencils, The Stms and a model .... Stripes, fingemail clippers, Psy Ops leaflets, bush They have been coming for months, at least once hats, bolos, and much more. Twice a week, when a week. All signed simply 'Pierre'. Whoever he is. the resupply choppers came in, they carried hot He certainly seems to know me, or know about chow in green Mermite cans and large canvas bags me- referring to favorite authors, incidents from filled with iced beer and soda pop. They carried my childhood, friends I have not seen for years. plastic water containers, each with a two-gallon He says repeatedly that he is comfortable there. capacity. Mitchell Sanders carried a set of starched He praises what he calls the tranquillity of the life. tiger fatigues for special occasions. Henry Dobbins He says, as though referring to an old joke, that carried Black Flag insecticide. Dave Jensen carried with my fondness for peace I would like it. He says empty sandbags that could be filled at night for war is unthinkable. A thing of the past. He de added protection. Lee Strunk carried tanning lo scribes the flowers in the little beds. He describes tion. Some things they carried in common. Tak the social life. He tells what he is reading. He asks ing turns, they carried the big PRC-77 scrambler why I never write. He asks why none of us ever radio, which weighed thirty pounds with its bat write. He says we have nothing to fear. tery. They shared the weight of memory. They took up what others could no longer bear. Often, they Merwin has published 13 books of his own poetry, carried each other, the wounded or weak. They many translations, and several prose works. If he has a carried infections. They carried chess sets, basket dominant motif in all of the writing, it is, 'Think again' balls, Vietnamese-English dictionaries, insignia of whether as warning, or as haunting: characteristic ti rank, Bronze Stars and Purple Hearts, plastic cards tles are, 'Unchopping a Tree', 'For the Anniversary of imprinted with the Code of Conduct. They car my Death', 'Shaving without a Mirror'. Merwin is a gain ried diseases, among them malaria and dysentery. sayer of the obvious. He is also a writer who for most of They canied lice and ringworm and leeches and his life has been trying to call a halt to our institutional paddy algae and various rots and molds. They car ized forms of life-profanation. 'Postcards from the Mag ried the land itself-Vietnam, the place, the soil inot Line' comes out of such a matrix. a powdery orange-red dust that covered their boots The Maginot Line, designed to shelter France and fatigues and faces. They carried the sky. The against Gennan invasion, was in the event an immense whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, ly expensive and elaborate blindfold over the national the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all consciousness. It was redundant the moment the Ger of it, they carried gravity. They moved like mules. man army invaded in 1940- the last fort surrendered, unassailed, on 30 June. Thirty years later, by supposi We speak of people 'bearing anns', and of others tion, Merwin is still receiving postcards frequently from 'bearing children'. In both cases we have in mind the one of the countless garrisoning 'Pierres', an Unknown experience of carrying, and the experience of undergo- VOLUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 33 ing something onerous. 'I can bear it' or 'I can't bear it', not of that kind, certainly, otherwise there would be no we say, of any number of things. There are also over Soldier of Fortune, and no Napoleon's. But the lost tones of honour or distinction attaching to arms-bear innocence of The Shield of Achilles is likely to be ing and child-bearing-implications of initiation and replicated whenever current or future wars are named adulthood, much as when, in Kipling's Kim , a charac attentively. They shared the weight of memory', says ter boasts that he both 'shot and begot' men. O'Brien's O'Brien, and, elsewhere in the narrative, it is clear that men are carriers, bearers, of goods and ills, things palli the men do just that. One fea ture of our species' behav ative and lethal. Individual bodies, and this whole small iour is that, jointly at least, we carry remembered knowl 'body' of people, carry about them and within them the edge, remembered agendas. We are the vectors of the insignia of many m eanings . Elsewhere in the book, the past. In his Of Arms an d Men, Robert L. O'Connell fortunes of particular people are explored, but in the quotes an authority on the longbow as saying, passage quoted the men are indeed like a mule train, slung about with objects useful, decorative, or afflictive, It has been discovered again, or perhaps it was a but in any case unable to be shrugged off. knowledge never quite lost, that within a yew log, What we are looking at here is a late-20th century rightly cut from the tree, are the natural compo version of that ancient trope, the military microcosm. nents of a 'self-composite' weapon, the perfect nat The most fa mous example of this in the western tradi ural material to resist tension, the sapwood, lyi ng tion is the shield of Achilles, as described in the 18th next to the perfect natural material to resist com book of The Iliad. There, the shield, which is also made pression, the heartwood. to be 'borne', portrays war and peace-in principle, all the world's affairs. Symbolically, Achilles will take the Later in the book, after quoting Leonardo ci a Vin world into battle when he goes: but not even the world ci's celebrated description of war as 'the most bestial will be able to keep him fro m his death. When W.H. madness', O'Connell reports: Auden wro te his The Shield of Achilles in 1952, he turned a grieving gaze upon the shining metal and saw Drawing on history, the speculations of contem that: poraries, and his own protean imagination, Leo nardo describes at one point or another caltrops, The mass and majesty of this world, all fireballs, poison arrows, torsion ca tapults, scythed That carries weight and always weighs the same chariots, Greek fire, mortars, cartridges fo r small Lay in the hands of others; they were small anns, air guns, steam catapults, a Gatling-type gun, And could not hope fo r help and no help came: rocket launchers, armored vehicles, submarines, What their foes liked to do was done, their and chemical warfare. sham e Was all the worst could wish; they lost their pride And, near book's end, on 'the era of the gun', 'Of all And died as m en before their bodies died. the arms conceived by Leonardo, only chemical weap ons were still being handled with some forbearance.' This tragical ethos has crept into most deliberated 'Forbearance' is rich: refl ected upon, it might remind us writing about war in our time. A great deal of writing is of debts owed to our predecessors, as well as responsi bilities owed our successors. A LAST woRD : John Pudney's Missing: Lo~!~J Less said the better . . \ !.<...,· 1 L \ ·\ ~ The bill unpaid, the dead letter, No roses at the end Of Smith, my fri end. We arc \\'Oil1l'l1 ·with ll \ igProu'-l bl'lil'l in our Cclp,lc Last words don't matter, ity ,111 d re'P"Ihibility t!l bring tlw C.o,pL•I t" lifL' in And there are none to fl atter. '"cil'lv ,1nd in the Church. Words will not fill the post Our L'ndl',1\'0ur: ) to work l!lr ju,tiCL' ) tu 'L'MCh tor truth Of Smith, the ghost. ) to find C"d in ,111 th1ng' .. 1n tlwl'rful cump.miun,hip or Smith, our brother, Only son of loving mother, The ocean lifted, stirred, '-,r . 'vl.ngM\'1 \·II nn Ill\ VI , Leaving no word. I nn:tt d l llll"l', /1 \ ' 11Hvlll Pl .llv C.,iJUth, i\lhvrl 1 1 .1r~ l20h. • Peter Steele SJ is holds a personal chair in English in the University of Melbourne. 34 A little down, but far from out 'I HEAR WEY BURNED YDUR MAGAZ>NE.' cut, and it is probably true that he is a shearer. But the 'No, just threatened to. The would-be incendiary name of his alleged destination in New South Wales had calmed down by the time he found the matches.' has changed with each new round of drinks. The reason 'Oh. Still, it was a good story. I'll keep repeating it for his quarrel with the dwarves is not clear, though he except when you're arotmd to deny it. Who was the is clearly less enthusiastic about the fight than they are. incendiary, anyway? A zealous animalliberationistwho None of the three is is having much luck in landing a wanted to punish you because you confessed to killing punch, because each is also trying to avoid the clutches a bat?'* of the bouncer. It is a Keystone Cops kind of fight but I 'That was in a different magazine. I have had com do not find it comical. The shearer and the dwarves are plaints about the bat, but so far they haven't included more depressing than Peter, and more depressing than any threats about bonfires. No doubt the complainants Flower Pot. Almost as depressing as magazine burners, are just and compassionate judges who accept my in fact. assurance that I feel genuine remorse.' Sancho and Mrs Sancho are outside by the hot-dog 'Unlikely, mate, unlikely. There's no fun in being stand, where they have met a neighbour. The neigh a judge if you're gonna let the culprit off the hook. bour carries a small, evil-smelling dog with long hair, Besides, it was a deed of unparalleled peversity. Even and she is treating them to an extended discourse on the fact that you owned up to it is shocking. You've no the art of toilet-training one's pets. Sancho and Mrs San shame, mate, no shame. A decent person would've just cho are very polite people. They do not interrupt her by buried the bat and not told a soul. Why, if wasn't for the saying anything pointed, such as 'Excuse us, but we are fact that it's your round, even I probably wouldn't want less than fascinated by dog turds.' I notice that neither to be seen talking to you.' of them has bitten into a hot dog yet, and tl1at Mrs San I order two more pots. 'Peter, your wish is granted. cho is looking a little green. The neighbour doesn't Drink alone.' I fall off the bar stool, but am pleased to appear to have noticed either fact. Sancho turns to me find myself on both feet when I make contact with the and raises one eyebrow, which I take to mean 'Please floor. And the pot has retained most of its contents. I get us out of this.' I desert them and head for home. lean against the bar, and after blinking a couple of times On the street I pass the shearer, now ejected from am further pleased to find that most of the objects in the pub and his evening of free drinks. He is sitting on my field of vision are in focus. the kerb, sobbing. In the open air I begin to sober up, A moving indiscriminate mass looms up on my and the melancholy that has been clawing its way around left, and then it too comes into focus. It is the woman the corners of my consciousness all night gradually takes in the flower-pot hat who has been trying to attract over. Peter's attention all night. Evidently, Flower Pot has When I get home, something is wedged inside the decided that action has a better chance of success than screen door. It is a postal tube, and inside is a small has enticement. I swerve to let her pass, and she gathers wooden stake filed to a point at one end. The accompa up enough momentum to launch herself at the object nying letter, headed 'Nightmoves Corp, The Castle, of desire. Peter and his bar stool crash to the floor, with Transylvania/ reads: 'Dear Quixote, Nightmoves Corp Flower Pot on top of them. This mountain of human has become aware of your recent horrific experience with flesh and tubular steel revolves a couple of times, scat one of the Bloodsucking Creatures of the Night. We tering drinkers on all sides, and then lies still. Passion enclose a free sample of one of our company's products, overcome by inertia. the Magnum Bat Eradication Device (BED). Upon From beneath the mountain a faint voice, which I encotmtering a BAT, the BED should be produced with recognise to be Peter's, pleads for rescue. I decline to go a flourish and thrust towards the assailant. This, together to his assistance or to Flower Pot's, and step over them with a statement of your intent to defend yourself (we instead. I lurch towards the end of the bar, looking for recommend something like "Are you feeling lucky, Sancho and Mrs Sancho, whom I know to be somewhere bat?") is usually enough to make the little bloodsucker around. The bouncer has seen all this but can't be both flee.' ered disentangling the mountain either, because he has Sometimes, a single anonymous message can do a real fight on his hands. more to dispel depression than all the boozy bonhomie Moving around the band-and weaving and bobbing in the world. Seizing the BED, I raise it skyward in defi ahnost in time with the pseudo-Irish reel it is playing ance of the night's demons, real and metaphorical. are a very tall shearer and two dwarves. The dwarves Are you feeling lucky, bats? • are twins who appear to do everything together, includ ing picking fights with solitary shearers. This particu Ray Cassin is the production editor of Eureka Street. lar shearer has been cadging drinks by telling people that he is stranded in Melbourne because floods have cut • Quixote's bat encounter is reported in Eureka Street, the Hume Highway. It is true that the highway has been May 1993 V OLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 35 THE WORLD M AX TEICHMANN moment. What I intend to do here is to delineate the new order we could have had after the end of communism, and then the new order that I fan cy is taking shape. Neither resembles the Alternative worlds collage of matchbox covers and snake oil rhetoric cobbl ed together by George Bush to justify the casual butcheries of the Gulf War. The ideali st position- the new peace eli vidend, and some of this would order that could have been: MAIO" WA> thi' cen turyA, and "'"'"after th'"e Gulf War, the peo- go to the stricken countries of Eastern 1. General disarmament would take ples of the world have been promised Europe and the Soviets, partly to stop place, as had been intended in 1945, a new deal, a new order, a better, safer them collapsing, partly as a reward for only to be sa botaged, purportedl y, by place in which to live. The rulers have throwing off their rulers and the com the Russian threat. This threa t has felt that some kind of hope, ome munist system, partly as a bounty for now disappeared. form of reparation, was necessary aft er wishing to embrace democrati c capi 2. The enormous arms trade could the ca m age, the endless sacrifices, the talism, and as an inducement to do it wind right back. It was running at a sense of being puppets in the hands of quickly. The United Nations would trillion dollars a yea r. The annual sal e leaders who never told them, never cease to be the neutered poodle of the of arms to developing countries had asked them, and seldom considered two super powers, and begin to come been proceeding at tens of billions a them . But the promises have rarely, if into its own as the independent voice year, making a mockery of aid pro ever, been kept. of the world community- which, af grams to such pl aces. Jf non-Western Lloyd George promised that Brit ter all, was the original intention in countries, especially, though not onl y, ain's World War I army would come establishing it. the Middle-Eastern and Pacifi c-rim home to a land fit for heroes, while These were all aspirations voiced nations, were ri ch enough to bu y huge Woodro w Wilson called that war the by masses of people in the West, picked quantities of modern weapons, then last wa r, the wa r to end all wars. The up by the media and somewhat reluc they were able to not only fee d their League of Nations would stop compct tantl y ba cked by Western govcm own peoples, but also to help the poor i tion tu ming in to conflict. In 1945 we ments. As for disannamcnt, onl y the in other countries. were pro mised One World, with free US and Russia seemed to match words 3. It appea red to be possible, at the end dom fo r all and freedom fro m fear. The with deeds. Britain, France and China of the Cold War, for environmental United ations, using the Charter, made it clear they were not in the issues to be tackled by the countries would spread the ideals of liberty, business of giving up the bomb, for that virtually decide how they and justice and peace throughout the without it they would be militarily everyone else should live. The best, world. We would turn swords into insignificant. and possibly the only place where ploughshares, and the merchants of The NATO orga ni sation, deeply decisions and changes of global im dea th would be put out of business. en trenched in European society, a! ter port could be made was the United All of those promises had a shelf natcly denied that the Russian threat N ations, freed of its great-power dom life of about six months. If the peopl es was at an end and ca me up with new inance. This UN, more and more, was of this earth wa nt peace and justice projects fo r remaining in uniform. where the greens were directing their and a tolerable life , they should not Plans for using NATO forces as peace attention. wait on their governments, as these keeping units-cum-intervention forc 4. Only an internati onal co-operative arc now constituted. They will have es in Europe, the Gulf, or anywhere in effort could destroy the drug trade. to do it themselves- if it is ever to be the world were ju t the m ost The extent to which this trade has done. Locke put this matter at hi s widely publicised aspects of the penetrated the legal, judicial, politi deliberately ambiguous best: if the NATO bureaucracy's rc- cal, policing and financial systems of impasse is co mpl ete, then we should istance to change . the world is horrendous, though not appeal to hea ven. This has oft en been very well known. In a way, these construed as alluding to revolution. EV ERYWHERE, the understanding of spinoffs from the drug industry arc The question, fo r m e, is not whether what was to be treated as important worse than the number of people it but how. and as requiring collecti ve acti on be kills, maims or impoverishes. When the Berlin Wall came down, gan to change dramatica ll y. T he ac 5. The new world order would have to the e nd of t h e Cold War was tivities of killing, of spying and sub face the fac t that 100 million people announced. Disarmament, especially verting, of propaga nda and psycholog arc migra tingcveryycar and that there n uclearclisarmamcnt, and the destruc ical mobilisation, of censorship and arc at lea t 20 million refugees, with tion of chemica l and gem1 weapons news-rigging, were to become far less number bound to rise as the result of would be pushed through. As there credible, while other major world is war, economic collapse, extreme pov were no tangible military threa ts, all sue , om e gigantic and possibly in erty, or the fra cturing of poli ticallegi t or most of the world network of bases soluble, started to move to cen trc stage. imacy. Attempts by individual coun would disappea r. There would be a I will remind peopl e of them in a tries or groups of countries to protec t 36 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMilER 1993 themselves are quite understandable, would inherit the earth. That is, un the US to the status of first among to me, but they have the effect of less it walked away and left the re equals. Early signs of American ina pushing the victims and migrants else maining countries to dispose of their bility to accept this situation might be where. Only a global effort to deal own and others' affairs as they wished. detected from the ubiquitous McCa with these pathological processes, at Many people in the US have wished rthyite mindset that emerged from their source, would suffice. that America would do just that. the Korean War onwards, and later, 6. Linked to the above is the fact that Alternatively, the US could iden the regrettable inability to accept de the world's population is running out tify itself with a world body that would feat in Vietnam. of control. Either many people will tackle the problems of global order for In other words, the live miserably while others live well, the good of all. That would be a re dream of 'manifest desti Great powers, like or they will try to gain access to what markable act of self-abnegation and ny' was never really the others have; or else they will try, has yet to be seen, although some renounced, and now that ruling classes, rarely by a mighty effort, to grow economic journalists and political publicists talk the communists have fall ally. The effects of this last strategy as though it goes on all the time. en into disarray and dis resign. Historically, upon the world's resources probably Or, faced with the new supremacy credit, and the Third World cannot be calculated, but analogies of the remaining superpower, coun has sunk like Puff the most of the countries from earlier phases of industrialisa tervailing forces would start to assem Magic Dragon, Americans that deferred to the tion and urbanisation make for small ble as in the old balance-of-power sys can go on like it's 1945 comfort. Once again, only global co tem, to contain and negate the new again. League or to the UN operation would have a chance of suc colossus. The second possible cess, even if only partial, and provi Finally, the overwhelming mili scenario, that the US did so under duress sional, in securing a liveable world. tary power of the colossus would not should work, with humil 7. A new world order, such as we could prevent its economic decline, just as ity and open-mindedness, of one kind or another. have had, would have to decide what Britain's military eminence last cen within a refurbished, im to do about the increasing numbers of tury did not prevent her being passed partial and genuinely in In the past, the global societies doomed to disintegrate, un by other economic rivals, such as dependentworld body, was hegemony of one great der the present in terna tional anarchy. Germany and the US. Even the an option approved by very Should the UN take sides in civil empire did not keep Britain great, few Americans, be they power has usually been wars, punishing seizures of power by but possibly made things isolationists or interven e.g. military juntas? Should it attempt '"T"" worse. tionists. Great powers,like prevented or checked, to redress the absence or paucity of ruling classes, rarely re human and civil rights in so many .1 HOSE ARE THE SORTS OF THINGS a sign. Historically, most of when it has been countries? And what should be done realist would say, so let us run through the countries that deferred about post-Cold War imperialists who the realists' alternative scenarios. The to the League or to the UN prevented or checked, refuse to mend their ways (including Americans are not going to withdraw did so under duress of one by the countervailing 'allies')? from the world system, as they did kind or another. In the past 8. What have been described above are after World War I. They have said that the global hegemony of one force of other countries, the symptoms of pathological eco they will not, and are more politically great power has usually nomic and political systems: a gross and militarily active than for years been prevented or checked, or groups of countries. maldistribution of wealth, with the past. They say they wish to involve when it has been prevent strongest preying on the weakest by a others, by which they appear to mean edorchecked,bythecoun- variety of means, including setting suborn them. It is a replay ofthe 'free tervailing force of other countries, or them against one another. The long world' global alliance. groups of countries. struggle, conducted pard y through the For a short time after the end of The final possibility that a realist old United Nations, to start redress World War II, Americans seemed to contemplating a world after the fall of ing the gap between rich and poor believe that they were the masters of the Wall might posit is that of an nations has failed. If anything, things the universe, what with the bomb, An1erica in irreversible economic de are getting worse. This is a sobering enormous wealth, Japan and Europe cline-an America for whom the pos thought, for if redistributive justice is prostrate, and the colonial empires session and periodic display of superi unattainable beyond a narrow range, breaking up. The United Nations was or military might, would be seen as a then the perverse inputs into our glo firmly in their control, with a little gigantic irrelevance. The treaties and bal existence, outlined above, will help from their friends. Aid programs, endless international conferences so continue. the CIA and the Bomb seemed able to loved by the media and the American That was the global agenda which take care of just about everything. But public would still go on, so long as the confronted us at the end of the Cold the Soviet Union's acceptance of the president or secretary of state got star War: a time of great challenges, of challenge of the nuclear arms race, the billing; but the economic strength new opportunities and of a renewal of rise of China, the emergence, under would inexorably shift to Europe and hope. What happened? cover of the superpower deadlock, of Asia. Political realists would tell us that, the Third World bloc, and the gradual The US, under Clinton as under in a bipolar world, if one of the major distancing of Europe and Japan from Bush, is trying to halt this decline and actors collapsed the remaining one US political agendas, steadily reduced to make the world market subservi- VOLUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 37 ent, as it was in 1945, to Anglo-Amer states- for money talks all languages. ica n financial power. It will be inter In the meantime, with all this e ting to see whether this can be polite warfare between the US, Eu achieved. Most likely it would have to rope and to a lesser extent Japan, the be done by the usual mea ns-finding promise made to Russia and Eastern ways of destabilising the competitors, Europe have not been kept, and the as the British did wi th the paniards, forces of chaos, crime and corruption the Dutch, the French and finally, the now rampant in those lands arc possi Germans. They would like to do the bly unmanageable. We have had to sam e again, but need American help. watch Boris Yeltsin's special units The option of war is nowada ys ruled bombarding Rus ia 's parliament, ob out-except with Arabs-though one served by Muscovites who'd bro ught cannot be completely sure. But there along their children and picnic bas are many new 'peaceful' ways availa kets. We were watching the end of a ble, besides the traditional ones of political system that had been groping playing countries off against one an towards democracy, only to be replaced other, bribing or suboming sections of by that apparent Russian fixture, a the competitor's elite structure, and newT ar. so on. (The CIA's budget was recently Yeltsin has no ideology, no moral raised by a billion dollars.) and political principles, other than Intemational organisations such those of unrestrained capitalism. This as the UN, GATT, the World Bank may have been an initial relief for and the IMF are being pressed into most Russians, after 70 years of brain service, as well as thespcculativc parts washing, but the moral vacuum has of the world money market. What is now turned into a black hole. Ycltsin's being described is a strategy of disrup attacks on parliament, the media, po tion and destabilisation, based upon a litical opponents, the constitution and zero-sum ga me. Your loss is my gain. local democratic bodies of considcra It goes against the conventional pro bl eantiquity, have been interpreted in fession of growth through co-opera the West as his having to de troy tion, rather than conflict or competi democracy in order to save it for the tion. This was the prevailing econom future. ic and political formula of Western As usually happens after a mili opinion makers until the end of the tary coup, new electi ons and a new Cold War. Indeed, we still hear it ad constitution have been promised, with vanced but reality belies appearance the whole thing being conducted even more obviously now than before. against the backdrop of a muzzled Whether the US can claw her way press, a scattered opposition, and mas back to world economic primacy has sive election funds for the incumbent. to be seen- but the projects and aspi What's new? A new balloon has fl oat rations of the people mentioned in our ed in from the Atlantic: some peoples Please send a free copy of beginning have little relevance, un may not be suited to democracy, and Eurel 38 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMfiE R 1993 IN M EMORIAM ANDREW BuLLEN Franlz Webb: II miglior fabbro-'the best of us' 23 November 1993 marks the 20th anniversary of the death of the Australian poet, Francis Webb. Webb, a schizophrenic, died of a coronary occlusion caused by excessive medication administered for his condition. He was on his way to Mass at the time. L," HOW Bruce Be.vcr in the twclith of his Lettm Webb sees, and his twisting, wry, tough language to Life Poets celebrates Frank Webb: tries to make us see, that Harry is 'this pudgy Christ'. To our abiding question 'Where is God to be found? ', I remembered Swift's Webb gives the blunt reply: 'Where we do not want to fascination with the insane, I whistled look, which is everywhere'. His poetry is notable for its Childe Rolande to the Dark Tower Came repeated stmggle to wrench its way towards receiving outside the grimy walls of Callan Park. the insight that those we reject and marginalise are the ones who reveal God to us. It makes bmtally clear that Inside-Il miglior fabbro-the best of us all suffering is the tme path-you have to be an inmate of chewing bloody knuckles, wept dry, the same ward to see the Harries of this world for who daft as a beadles chicken circling the du t. they are. No less notable, and for the same reason, Where are the prayas said for him Webb's poetry does not quit this insight once it is gained-once in such a place of revela Twenty years after Frank Webb's tion, you stay there. Webb died there, 20 death there remains, looms up indeed, years ago: the most uncompromising collection of poetry in our culture to provoke an Because the wise world has for ever answer to that question. Webb's poet and ever rejected ry repeatedly draws his readers toward Him and because your children the abiding questions we flinch from. would scream at the sight Who else among Australian writ Of his mongol mouth stained with ers exposes our human frailty so direct food, he has resurrected ly, and by exposing his own so The spontaneous though retarded relentlessly? Who else shows our fel and infantile Light. lows so constantly wincing in pain? Transfigured with him we stand Who has heard the gospel with such Among walls of the no-man's land ... aching attention? Whatever our local names for With the closure of large institutions Jemsalem, that place of death and res the mentally sick may be less hidden urrection, Webb's was 'Ward Two'. nowadays. Many of the homeless in Aus As an inmate there hin1self, he dis tralia suffer from schizophrenia, as did covers, in a sequence of eight poems, Etching by Tim Metherall Webb; but still he asks 'What do we see?' the conditions of our fellowship. No Harry is a more radical poem than even where more so than in Harry, which celebrates (that is Les Murray's deservedly popular An Absolutely Ordi the word) the 'moron' set somewhat apart by his fel nary Rainbow, because a total acceptance of the claims lows, because he reveals to them the tmth of their con it makes upon us demands that we look at Harry and dition by his attempts to write what his fellows yarn say not so much 'There, but for the grace of God, go I' as about: 'There, with the grace of God, go I.' The poem, it is worth adding, is the best thing written in Australia about the It's the day for writing that letter, if one is able, priesthood. And so the striped institutional shirt is wedged The moral power of Webb's poetry justifies the ver Between this holy holy chair and table. bal straining he so frequently is forced to, for somehow, He has purloined paper, he has begged and cadged anyhow, he has to make our 'giddy alphabet' carry un The bent institutional pen, spilled 'the cmet of i1mocence'. Although here he speaks The ink, and our droll old men with the mumbled whisper of an altar server, his kind Are darting constantly where he weaves his of music is more often made from sounds of stress. He sacrament. loved Mahler, and splendidly called Bruckner that VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 39 FORTHCOMING FROM OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 'devisor of sym phonic boa-constrictors'. There are times when Webb's readers know what it is to be coiled about by poetic boa-constrictors. It is hard to extricate our LIVING DECENTLY selves fro m this poetry. As far as his music goes, when he is happy Webb hears church bells, either ringing Material Well-being in Australia throughou t creation as 'Bells, bells of ocean' in his Peter Tra vers and Sue Richardson Christmas poem, Five Days Old, or in 'Gay golden val leys of banter' ringing throughout Bells of StPeter Man Living Decently describes material well-being in croft, and so revealing 'A frisson of gold at the centre/Of Australia at the end of the 1980s, and reaches conclusions prayer, bright core of life.' Both these poems neverthe that are surprisingly positive. Unpersuaded by the 'gloom less reassert his conviction, his repeated discovery, that and doom' accounts of life in Australia that abound, the we must 'blunder and wander' beyond the bounds of authors critically examined the measures used in these normalcy, and acknowledge that 'To blown straw was accounts. They have designed better measures of material given/ All the fullness of Heaven'. How right that well-being and poverty, which paint a more accurate and Michael Griffith's biography of Webb is titled God's Fool. rather more encouraging picture of how Australians were How strange that the other Australian poet wor iiving at the end of the 1980s. thy of such a title is John Shaw Neilson. How intrigu This rosy picture, however, is under threat in the 1990s, ing that his music, almost in extreme contrast to Webb's and the authors make recommendations on how volatile sounds, is about as close to silence as pure words Australians might live as decently in the future as they can get. Intriguing, too, that Neilson has been acknowl ha ve in the past. Living Decently is a challenging and edged as their master by figures as formidable as James timely addition to the literature on material well-being, McAuley and Judith Wright. Is it then purity of spirit poverty, welfare and social economics in Australia. and Neilson and Webb have it in such differing ways 0 19 553360 7 224 pages paperback $1 9.95 that ultimately singles out who is to be recognised by fellow poets as il miglior fabbro, the 'better craftsman'? *DUE NOVEMBER 1993* Maybe Eliot's naming Ezra Pound as such in the dedica O.U.P., GPO Box 2784Y, Melbourne, Victoria 3001 tion of The Waste Land suggests not, though there's a poem that winds its way through hell and out. So ba ck to The Divine Comedy, where the phrase is first used, as Dante m eets in Purgatory the famous Proven<;:al trou badour, Arnaut Daniel, whom he, and Petrarch, too, ac Wisdom & De1nons knowledged as master. For his part, Beaver assuredly by Dorothy A. Lee acknowledges Webb to be his pre-eminent precursor and and John Hanner SJ. guide through his own inferno and purgatorio-'Dark light dark sings all my tiny heart' as Webb puts it in These scripture meditations, by Ephpheta. And in Five Days Old there is a momentary a Protestant biblical scholar and a Catholic theologian, are woven paradiso-'My trembling is all my prayer.' around two themes: our deepest Webb's work gives the gospel to us straight. That doubts and despairs-our de is why his writing coils and wrenches and staggers. What mons-and the healing grace of makes him difficult reading is that to read him is to Wisdom, the feminine image of Lmdergo a kind of final judgm ent. He is in our streets, God in the Bible. Aurora Books/David Lovell too. • Publishing. $15.95 Andrew Bullen SJ is a poet and teacher. Regaining Compassion • Michael Griffith's biography of Webb, God's Fool, is published by Collins/Angus & Robertson. On 20 No by Charles Birch vember friends and fellow poets will discuss Webb's This inspiring new book by work in a one-day seminar at the North Sydney campus award-winning Australian of Australian Catholic University. Enquiries: thinker Charles Birch argues (02) 739 2192. that only the rebirth of com passion-for ourselves, each other and our planet-can save us from disas ter. Rosary House NSW University Press $17.95 Urgently required: chalice, monstrance, Both books available from Jesuit Publications, statue of Our Lady. PO Box 553, Richmond VIC 3121. Tel {03) 427 7311. Please help. x {03) 428 4450. Include $3.50 for postage and 1dling, and $1.50 for each subsequent book. (03) 364 8725 _j 40 EUREKA STREET • NovEMBER 1993 E XPLORATIONS M ARK DEASEY Monumental preoccupations cAMOODOA' S CDNTRAD>CTIONS AND UNCffiT NNTffiS of war and the shaky UN peace, of a glorious past and a precarious future, of poverty for most and conspicuous new wealth for a few-are demonstrated more starkly in Siem Reap, home to the Angkor monuments, than anywhere else in the country. I first went to Siem Reap in 1988, on a half-day tour of Angkor Wat and the near by Bayon temple. Flights then were few and irregular, and priority was given to 'fraternal socialists'. Austral ian aid workers were low on the list, and more than once I had been moved down the queue because a Bulgarian or East German delegation had arrived at the last minute. Eventually a well-placed friend pulled strings and got me on an excursion arranged for resident Vietnam ese academics and technicians. I departed on the morn ing flight from Phnom Penh, the sole Westerner on a plane with 44 Vietnamese and a French-speaking Cambodian guide. Security was a fraught issue even then. We were luckier than many in being taken to the Bayon temple, the forest surrounds of which precluded visits on 'bad' days. This was followed by a brisk tour through the vast spaces of Angkor Wat itself, before lunch in the dining room of the otherwise empty Grand Hotel in Siem Reap. Now two, or three or four planes a day bring tour My host this time was the local head of UNESCO, It's partly the forest ists on the 45-minute flight across the Great Lake from which is trying to co-ordinate international efforts to reclaiming the past, and Phnom Penh. The most direct land route is effectively restore the Angkor monuments. We were taken to his partly the past being impassable, the road being little more than a series of home in the Angkor Conservation Authority's com reclaimed fro m the pot-holes through swamp and forest territory that is pound on the edge of town. There, behind high ochre forest-ficus tree trunk largely under Khmer Rouge control. But the tourist traf walls and shaded by huge trees which carpet the ground near the Ta Prohm fic is outstripped by the volume of UNTAC (United with their aromatic dry leaves, are several vast ware temple. Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia) person house-workshops. There sculptures and carvings from nel and goods arriving and departing. Australian, Bang the temples are restored, repaired, or in the case of the Photo: Mark Deasey ladeshi, Dutch, French, Malaysian and Tunisian troops most vulnerable, copied, so the originals can be kept throng the terminal at Siem Reap airport, and in town safe until security from theft can be better ensured. The the dozen new and refurbished hotels are overshadowed sight of so many ancient and priceless sculptures, casu by the sprawling French barracks, the pre-fab Australian ally disposed in sheds and shelters, is bizarre. A team of camp and communications centre-it looks like a Kim 15 archaeologists and restorers from India came here in berleys mining camp-and the Indian-run field hospi the mid-1980s, and until 1991 they provided the only tal. Several bars decked-out with coloured lights do a help coming from the outside world. UNESCO, the noisy trade among military and tourist clientele, and International Labour Organisation and several others the markets probably sell more beer than any other single have now joined in, but the Indian team continues stead commodity. ily as before. VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 41 We spent the re has belatedly been given worldwide listing as a protect mainder of the morning ed site, and acquisition of its artefacts can now lead to atAngkorThom ('Great prosecution. But collectors with more money than scru Angkor') the ruins of the ples still find middlemen willing to run the fairly small great walled city of the risks. Khmer Empire. Even the Returning through the thorny scrub to Preah Khan, few short kilometres we passed the travellers' infirma1y built by Jayavarman along the forest road VII. The academies, hospices and other public buildings from Angkor Wat was of his reign have earned him the reputation of being an enough to leave 90 per enlightened and benign monarch-the fact that these The permanent sign cent of the tourist traffic behind. Those who did make great works were built with the labour of armies of comes soon, we hope: it were hushed by the towering trees and ruined Bayon slaves, is glossed over. In enchanting contrast to the marker indicating temple, with its faces carved in the smiling likeness of massive slave-built structures, however, is Banteay Srei. provincial human King Jayavaraman VII . As we perused the bas-reliefs, Much fuss was made of Paul Keating's visit there in rights office. with their amazingly vivid depictions of war and peace 1992, as the temple is in a remote part of the forest, under the Khmer kings, we could hear shell fire more than an hour's drive along rough roads from Siem Photo: Marl< Deasey echoing in the distance, probably 40km away Reap, and overshadowed by a mountain long known as through the forest towards the Thai border. a Khmer Rouge hide-out. In such a location, the lyrical beauty of Banteay A NGKOR HAS BEEN FIERCELY HELD by the Phnom Penh Srei is all the more captivating. Tradition has it that the government, which has promoted the revival of Cam temple was built by a monk who enlisted the voluntary bodia's culture and traditions as part of its claim to le help of the local people. Built on a very human scale, it gitimacy. The monuments have been no less fiercely nestles in the shade of huge forest trees; the carvings in fought for by the Khmer Rouge, whose model of a rare pink sandstone are of a delicacy and finesse regimented society owes at least as much to the meth unmatched elsewhere, and the smiling sculpted door ods of the 12th century Angkor Empire as it does to keepers seem to offer a personal greeting. But enjoyment Marx. Prince Norodom Ranariddh's faction also con of the dappled light playing on the bas-reliefs is mixed tests the right to win it, to reinforce its claims to with a constant nervousness of what the forest and the hereditary feudal sway over Cambodia. All have incor mountain could be hiding: at the first gateway, a red porated the image of Angkor, in various stylised ver skull-and-crossbones affixed to a makeshift fence warns sions, onto their flags. that there are mines laid around the temple precinct. The afternoon took us further along the narrowing As at all the monuments, there are armed guards on forest road to the Preah Khan ('Sacred Sword') temple, a duty but here they patrol more vigilantly, mindful of dense mass of colonnades and courtyards that may have every step the handful of visitors take. functioned as an academy. After negotiating a way in Three-quarters of the way back to the relative through the rubble of a collapsed wall overgrown with security of the town, we stopped to see Ta Prohm, one creepers, we met a New Zealand archaeologist from the of the last temples to be discovered. Entering from the World Monuments Fund, supervising a team of Cam north gate, we fought our way through dragging scrub bodians who are clearing away 20-odd years of jungle and over piles of tumbled masonry to come with a shock growth so that restoration work-which is expected to into the central courtyard. It is impossible not to be take 10 years-can begin. She led us to a point on the overcome with awe at the trees of massive girth with western wall where a great garuda, the mystic eagle/ their great roots sundering roofs and walls. The trees griffin of Hindu mythology, had been brought to see the form a dense canopy, casting the whole into deep green light of day. At one point along the track lay a recently shade. The few visitors apart from ourselves were felled tree, a 25-metre giant of several decades growth. Khmers on holiday from Phnom Penh, the young women Half its bulk had clearly been sawn with hand tools into armed with suitcases full of petite tailored outfits, in planks; this circumvents the ban on log exports, as ille which their swains were to photograph them gal timber-cutters (some of them reputedly the same daintily posed against naga heads, pillars or police who are meant to prevent the traffic) cut up trees tree boles. where they fall and speedily move the crude planks over the short distance to the Thai border. L E LATE AFTERNOON brought some respite from the Thieving of all kinds can be breathtakingly blatant. round of weighty temples, as my host took me out to On a visit two weeks previously, my host had seen two the great Baray-a vast irrigation reservoir built by the Thai men emerge from a vehicle, armed with a tape Angkor kings, and restored to operation in the 1960s. measure with which they measured the head of a gate This water supply, irrigating the fertile plains through way naga (seven-headed serpent) before testing its weight the dry season, is in part responsible for Siem Reap's for transportability-all quite unabashed by the pres relative prosperity. It was Chinese New Year, and much ence of uniformed UNESCO staff. They departed non of the town's population, Chinese or otherwise, had chalantly, no doubt to return under cover of dark. Angkor come out to promenade along the top of the dam wall, 42 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMilER 1993 where refreshment vendors were positioned, and pho lakeshore commwtities, and infiltrate Kompong Chang tographers were touting for trade. A boatman, his chest and Pursat provinces to the south. decorated with a semicircle of sacred chann tattoos, On my last evening before heading home, I found rowed us the mile out to the small island in the centre myself at sunset at the top of theTa Keo temple, yet of the lake, where a few remains of a temple sit among another massive structure in grey granite and sandstone. the water plants. In a well in the temple courtyard was It is stark and undecorated, as the king who ordered its once found a great cast bronze image of Vishnu. The construction was murdered before the flat stone surfac boatman told us he'd been born by the lakeshore and es were carved, and the usurper, as was the custom, aban lived there all his life, but had never known how wide doned the project to set about building a monument to or deep the lake measured, how old the temple was, or his own greater glory. This practice accounts for the great to whom it was dedicated. I hastily leafed through the number of temples of the period, and the abruptly short guidebook-written by a French archaeologist in the ened reigns of most of the Angkor kings. According to a l960s-to find what he wanted. Cambodian folk tradition, the massive effort required One UNESCO staff member had previously worked to build so many temples in so short a time, leaving as head of the provincial fisheries department, and on perhaps hundreds of thousands of slaves dead, left the the Sunday his successor invited us to lunch at his of Khn1er people exhausted and frightened of their rulers. fice, which floats on the Tonle Sap lake. With a slab of When the empire cnunbled they went to hide in the Steinlager to sweeten our welcome, we drove from town forests, and have been unwilling ever since to re-emerge down the river bank road, first through the lush irrigat and rebuild a great nation. ed orchards, then the great expanse of rice land, until Post script: Phnom Penh, July 1993. My friend the grey-green swathe of mangroves annotmced the edge Vuthy flicks through photos he took from his balcony of the Great Lake. The fishing settlements rise and fall in April, the day the Khmer Rouge attacked Siem Reap. with the lake, which doubles its area when the Mekong A flurry of figures in the trees, not much more. There floods push the Tonle Sap river back up its channel. are other shots: displaced people camped at Angkor Wat. Several thousand people live in a floating town on the It was probably never the Khmer Rouge's aim to cap shallow waters of the lake, harvesting one of the world's ture and hold Siem Reap town-the scare and headlines most abundant fresh-water fisheries. A waiting boat took were points scored enough. But more of the country- us down the narrow channel lined with houseboats to the open lake; the air was thick with the smells of rotting Chronology reeds and sun-warn1ed fish entrails. About half the population here are ethnic Vietnam AD802 Jayavarman IT founds the city of Angkor. ese. Many have been in Cambodia for several genera 944 Rajendravarman expands Khn1er influence into north-east Thailand, tions and speak Khmer more readily than Vietnamese, wins eastern territory from the Chams; introduces tolerance of Buddhism. but tltis has not spared them the wrath of the Khmer 1003 Suryavarman extends Angkor's control westward; expands trade. Rouge or the pro-American right. They are accused of 1120-1 150 Angkor Wat built at the command of Suryavarrnan IT. Suryavar being disguised Vietnamese troops or insidious colonis man campaigns against Vietnam. ers, fit to be massacred or driven out. When we picked a 1181 Jayavarrnan vn succeeds; Buddhism established as state religion. Jaya dead waterbird out of the lake, we were told by our host varman orders building of the Bayou, Ta Prohm, Preah Khan and Neak Poan that this was because the Vietnamese used poison to temples, as well as hospitals and hostels. stun fish. They are also blamed for dynamiting and oth 1191 Jayavarman captures the capital of the Cham kingdom. er practices that are reducing fish numbers-though 13th century Khn1er capital shifts from Angkor to Phnom Penh; slow de close observers admit that Khmers sometimes do cline of the Khn1er power begins. likewise. 1560s Brief restoration of Angkor. But it was a pleasant and indolent Sunday lunch in 1853 France begins to establish influence over Cambodia. the fisheries office on its raft, with the vast brown and 1953 Cambodia gains independence from France. blue expanse of lake and sky at the door, and the small craft beetling to and fro. The Steinlager (Victoria Bitter side was rendered insecure, and the peasants, whose fate and Foster's are also being heavily promoted, by com is never as newsworthy as that of tourists, gathered up peting importers) washed down freshwater prawns, dried their few transportable belongings and took shelter in fish cooked in sugar palm syrup, and a stew of fresh fish the galleries of the monument. Cooking pots, straw mats and water vegetables. On the way home, we drove to and blue plastic tarpaulins are strung between columns the top of Phnom Kraum, a bare nob of a matmtain stand and bas reliefs. In one photo the director of UNESCO, ing alone on the lakeshore plain. In Angkor days the ill at ease, in his apple-green Lacoste and tailored khak crumbling shale temple on its summit was used as a is, stands amidst a dusty rural throng. The tourists may lookout for the raiders from Java and the Cham empire take a while to come back. • who sailed up the Mekong from the South China Sea and gradually weakened the Khmer empire. Khmer Mark D easey is Indochina program co-ordinator for Rouge raiding parties still travel by dinghy under cover Community Aid Abroad. He has lived and worked in of night from the forests of Kompong Thorn to terrorise Cambodia for three years. VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 43 BooKs Ross M cMuLLIN In short, it's Manning Clarlz B ,CAU'> m Pm• R ""'' 44 EUREKA STREET • N ovEMBER 1993 FESTIVALS MARGARET SIMONS Not a word out of place tween 'the enlargers of life' and the to read that Phar Lap had won the 'moral gaolers' and 'straiteners of hu Melbourne Cup twice. Ryan is hardly A FEW YEARS AGO, Brisbane seemed, to the casual manity'. likely to read Cathcart's abridgem ent, visitor, to be a city almost entirely without book It is to the credit of both Clark and but if that storeman ever does he will shops-other than the sort that sold books on how Cathcart that some of the descriptive be relieved to find that the error he to look after your indoor ferns, and Jane Fonda's passages of significant events work spotted has not been repeated. latest workout. There were bookshops, of course, well in the shortened version, such as Some other slips in Clark's vol but you had to know where to look. Compared to the ceremony marking the federation mnes, however, have not been cor Adelaide, a city of fewer people but more literature, of Australia. Clark would have been rected. The age at which Jack Lang is the written word was almost invisible. Thanks to pleased that his coverage of the con said to have died is wrong. There is a Expo, and a fast-expandingpopulation, Brisbane has troversial bodyline cricket series has case of mistaken identity concerning changed quickly. For the southern visitor, the first been trimmed relatively lightly; afoot the AIF general who gave an em otion impression is of relaxed prosperity. People here talk note in Volume VI listing the refer al speech in Melbourne in December about the recession, but there are brand-new shops ences supporting his account-writ 1915; both Clark and Cathcart name everywhere, and the old ones have all been renovated. ten over half a century after the events him as 'Major-General I. G. McKay', Brisbane is more sophisticated, but the written he is describing-of the absorbing sec presumably intending to refer to Iven word still doesn't draw much interest. Writers' ond match of the series contains sev Mackay, when it was in fac t someone Week, held as part of last month's Warana festival, eral newspaper sources supplemented altogether different, James W. McCay. had an exciting program-including a trip to Strad by 'personal memories of the ga me'. And the assertion that the political broke Island (BYO shade, pillow and picnic basket) There are times when the writing entity which became known as the to celebrate black Australian writing, and to pay in the abridgement is superbly vivid Australian Labor Party was spelt Labor tribute to the late Oodgeroo Noonuccal. Yet attend and entertaining. I liked the arresting 'officially since 189 1' is a very dubious ances were poor. On a sunny Sunday afternoon, sentence describing Eric Campbell of one when the party's official report of local writers read their work to an audience of fewer the N ew Guard as 'a braggart, a stmt the proceedings of its own supreme than 40 people, tucked into a comer of the art ter and a limelighter'. And I enj oyed policy- making body, federal confer gallery. once again Clark's analysis of the var ence, was referring to the party as the Thea Astley, who has drawn audiences of up to ious reasons prompting Australians Australian Labour Party as late as 1908. a thousand at recent Adelaide and Melbourne writ to enlist in 1914: 'One was attracted My main reservation about the ers' festivals, spoke on the same day to a half-empty by "brilliant uniforms, marching sol abridged volume is that the necessar auditorium. There were perhaps 2.00 people present. diers, music, dmms and glory"; one ily heavy pnming has som etimes re Astley, and the man sharing the stage, Canadian was "itching to git a dig at few Ger sulted in characters and them es ap writer David Adams Richards, were talking on the mans"; one wanted to "do his bit to pearing in the narrative without suffi topic 'Heartlands'-the places that they love, and wipe out such an infamous nation"; cient explanatory connection or con that inspire them to write. one was there because if he had not text for the uninitiated, but this is Astley talked about how the unease and tension been there he would never be able to more of a comment on the magnitude of the far north Queensland rainforest inspired her. look any decent girl in the face again; of the task than a criticism of the way 'Whatever conversations I hear and use, whatever one was there because he would not Cathcart has undertaken it. The characters I notice on aeroplane flights or in shop be able to "look men in the face again"; absence of footnotes is appropriate ping centres, they all get transported to somewhere and another was there because he those interested can consult them in north of the Tropic of Capricorn in my writing.' would not have to look his wife in the the original volumes-and the abridge Astley has now moved south, but says that al- face again for quite a while.' ment comes with its own index. . though her present home is 'very beautiful' she Wherever possible Clark told Aus Cathcart wanted his abridgement doesn't believe she could write about it. tralia's history through the experienc 'to show Manning at his best', and 'to The heartlands of writers do not always return es of individual people, and he was open Clark's rich and strange Austral the love, or take the writing to their hearts. But irresistibly drawn to stories about trag ia to a wider public gaze'. He has perhaps it doesn't matter. Richards told the gather ic characters, especially if they were succeeded in doing both. • ing about his upbringing in remote northern Canada, fa tally fl awed. Accordingly, this book among people who proudly wear the label 'redneck'. contains plentiful references to pre Ross McMullin is a fr eelance histori He addressed the Brisbane audience wearing a base dictably prominent people like Henry an. His most recent book is The Light ball cap (the right way round) and a tough-man air. Lawson, Alfred Deakin and, in the on the Hill: The A ustralian Labor He spoke of the difference between the people he chapter about the ill-fated expedition Party 1891-1991. grew up with, who did not read novels, and the he headed, Robert O'Hara Burke. Cath creative writing community he had come to know. cart also manages to find room to ENNEAGRAM CONFERENCE 'I have dear friends in the creative community,' he include in his big cast such quintes Melbourn e, 8-9 janu ary 1994 drawled, 'but I believe that if I had to make the sential Clark characters as C.Y. Principa l Spea ker: Dr jerome choice in a heartbeat, I would want to be with the O'Connor and W.J. Chidley. Wagner, lnstitute for Pastora l people I was born with, rather than with the people Peter Ryan has recorded that a Studies, Chi cago. I have come to know.' • storem an at Melbourne University Enqui ries Co ntact: The Centre of Press, flicking through the gleaming Margaret Simons is a freelance writer. Her recent Spiritu ality, PO Box 1110, Bendi go, pages of Volume VI when it had just novel, The Ruthless Garden, is published by Angus Vi ctoria 3550. Tel: (054) 41 6 877 arrived fro m the printer, was appalled & Robertson. V oLUME 3 NuMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 45 T HEATRE GEOFFREY MILNE Spring on the boards T ,mucwTTHC>mco•"ofM 46 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMilER 1993 years to achieve a balance between shape of the produc exciting international productions, tion was thus faint good work from interstate companies ly reminiscent of the and individuals, and local work. Fur famous white box thermore, this year's seemingly vague style of Peter Brook's theme of 'triumph in adversity' man Royal Shakespeare ifested itself much more effectively Company produc than last year's apparently sharper tions of the 1970s, Columbus theme. What was also in but vastly moreflex teresting in this year's theatre pro ible. Although I gram was the tendency for the plays to found it hard to get come in pairs. Thus we had two works involved in the per examining death and AIDS, two re formance, it was fas markably contrasting approaches to cinating to see how Shakespeare's neglected (probably just certain theatrical ly) Titus Andronicu , and two singu traditions have larly different plays from leading Aus evolved in Europe in tralian theatres for young people. a way that doesn't Death and AIDS, and death from happen much here. AIDS, lay at the heart of the distin The Romanians cer guished Sydney photographer William tainly earned a place in an Australian children's book by Morris Gleitzman, Highly strung Titus: Yang's slide show and largely autobi festival but it is ridiculous that they Blabbermouth. This latter was a de Renata Cuocolo in the ographic monologue Sadness, which should have come all the way here for lightfully gentle look at disability (the Theatreworks production quietly but quickly became one of the just one long weekend in one Austral inability of the central character, Ro of Titus Andronicus. hot events of the festival (not surpris ian city, to be seen by fewer than wena, to speak) triumphing over ad ingly, perhaps, since the Beckett The 10,000 people. versity, in a play for primary school Photo: Lyn Pool atre in the Malthouse seats barely The Melbourne-based alternative children that worked very well. The 200). But Yang's piece was also suf company Theatreworks attacked the former was a hard-hitting and poten fused with life; somewhat in the style play rather differently, commission tially very strong play (not necessarily of a thriller, it was a triumphant ac ing David Pledger to translate and for youngsters at all) about intoler count of his search for identity as well adapt it in such a way as to make it ance and prejudice, intermarriage and as a chronicle of death. The Melbourne relevant to Australia's multicultural reprisal in a rural town. It suffered a playwright Michael Gurr's play about community. Pledger stripped Shake bit, however, in the transfer from the living with AIDS, Desirelines, was speare's play back to the essentials of intimacy of Adelaide's Theatre 62 to rather less satisfying as an evening in its action-plot, casting the warlike the sprawling and less-focused space the theatre, despite its more orthodox Goths as Vietnamese-Australians and of the Universal Theatre in Fitzroy. dramatic stmcture and a definite ring splitting the Romans (for reasons best Crossroads Theatre's production of tmth, coming as it did out of a series known to himself) into two groups, of Englishman Daniel Scott's rather of workshops conducted among AIDS with Titus, his followers and some of tedious play about domestic violence, sufferers. The play's unrelieved tone his family speaking Italian, and Satur Below the Belt, failed to show this of grief and anger gave it the ninus and his people speaking Eng enterprising Sydney alternative thea feeling of a polemical pam- lish. The part of the utterly evil tre company off to its best advantage. phlet. 'Moor'-who is responsible for some Diana Bliss's production of Paul of the most unspeakably dreadful ac Doust's Lady Bracknell's Confine EASILY THE BIGGEST theatre event tions in the play-was given to a Woi ment gave the festival its theatrical was the Romanian National Theatre wurmng-speakingAboriginal. The bi dessert (with the redoubtable Gordon of Craiova's Titus Andronicus, which zarre jumble thus achieved was, odd Chater coming out of retirement to had five performances in the cavern ly, comprehensible enough linguisti tell this preposterous but entertaining ous State Theatre (in Romanian, with cally, but its effect was to highlight story) after its many solid main deadpan, heavily-accented Shake hostilities in our supposedly jolly mul courses. speare in headphones, which in my ticultural community. In many ways, this was, the most case failed to function). What was Adelaide's leading theatre for interesting Melbourne Festival since impressive about this production was young people, Magpie Theatre, 1988. Thereareneverthelessanumber the relative simplicity of the means of brought its 1992AdelaideFestivalhit, of problems about this festival (and its image-making. Apart from some Funerals and Circuses (by the Aborig about Australian festivals generally), remarkable Guignol-style shadow play inal playwright Roger Bennett) to the to which I shall return next month. and a marvellous sense of ritual and Melbourne International Festival, ceremony, thestagingwas based large while Melbourne's equally celebrated • ly on wheeled, hospital-style furni Arena Theatre co-produced (with the Geoffrey Milne is head of the division ture and a number of flowing, Melbourne Theatre Company) Mary of drama at LaTrobe University, and unbleached calico cloths. The overall Morris's adaptation of the widely-read a drama critic for the ABC. V OLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 47 EXHIBITIONS DAMIAN C OLERIDGE ncentomania simply adds to the cred that Van Gogh and other 19th Van Gogh m yth . century artists had purposefully con We're all too famil structed themselves in this way, as iar with it-the cra mad, which is another contemporary zy, spurned genius telling of the story. dashing off his mem For their part, Mollison and the orable paintings in a exhibition tell the story of a young pa inter in frenzy of inspiration. Dutch artist who began painting in · . . . . never sold a earnest, in 1880, at the age of 2 7. Five picture m his lifenme d rh . h " Quite how this myth . n ' at IS years later he was in Paris, where, as m uence ha.~ been. and will prob;bl arose is one of the ronrtnue to be, incalculable. ' great mysteries; but one of a younger generation of artists soon after his death who swapped pictures and ideas, he in 1890 people were complaining about had the good fortune to discover col how difficult it was to see the pictures our and a marvellous, intense way of because of the stories that surrounded applying paint. During the next five ~ GotH" me MON>., 'll eight, them. The art critic John Berger took years he painted the great, exciting and don't we love the irony of it. It has up this point in his TV series and works that we admire still, then he become a journalistic cliche: the artist book, The Ways of Seeing. Berger died. In one sense, his career was just who didn't sell very many pictures showed Van Gogh's last painting, beginning. Had he lived, by 1900 he when alive, (he sold about 40), but Wheatfield with Crows, without a would have been a successful artist on whose work is now so expensive that caption, and then with a caption which his way to becoming one of the most it is impossible to insure. 'They reck described it as Van Gogh's last work. successful artists of all time. (Though on he was mad/ said the filmmaker Stories still circulate about the pic try imagining him old and rich like Paul Cox, 'but it is we who are mad.' tures as we continue to tell the Van Picasso.) The ironies abound, and all the Gogh story either in song- Dong It is a story which attempts to more so in mid-November, when the McLean and a recent musical-or demythologise Van Gogh. The Van most costly exhibition yet to come to painting, or especially film. From Vin Gogh of this exhibition is an artist Australia, Vincent Van Gogh-His cent Minnelli's 1956 Metrocolor biog who, according to Mollison, was 'no Sources, Genius and In fluence, opens raphy Lust for Life, starring Kirk Doug more mad than anyone else'. After the at the National Gallery of Victoria. las as your full-on mad genius, to Paul triumph of the Van Gogh centenary Not only is it costly to bring here Cox's dignified Vincent. The Life and retrospective in Amsterdam in 1990- each Van Gogh picture has its own Death of Vincent Van Gogh (1987), there were more than 600 works and courier, for instance-but, with an with John Hurt reading from Van the TV rights were sold to Japan entrance price of $16 a head, even the Gogh's letters, and Robert Altman's Mollison decided that the time was exhibition's curator, gallery director Vincent and Thea, concerning the right to present Van Gogh as an artist James Mollison, concedes that it is 'a brothers Van Gogh and the art mar like any other: 'I believe that Australia big ask'. Just to break even, the exhibi ket, there has been no end of films on got the show because I presented the tion will have to pull in more people, Van Gogh. 'Did you see the Altman notion of an exhibition that would rid and more dollars a day, than any pre film1' I asked a film critic recently. one community- the Australian com vious show. 'I'd love to see its budget' 'No', she replied, 'I saw the shorts for munity- of all the silly romantic commented one connoisseur of these it and I thought "not another film myths that have emerged around this matters. about Van Gogh as a god, as a great 111a11. ' The talk about money, of course, sufferer''-' Interestingly, she consid- This was the serious, art-histori- 48 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMBER 1993 cal point that the proposed exhibition Van Gogh and Cloisoni m, was de part of the mythology of Van Gogh. intended to make. And these day you scribed by Robert Hughes as placing Because we've got the name we think don't get a loan of any pictures, let Van Gogh 'in a clear but somewhat this is going to cause money to flood alone Van Goghs, unless you're mak unfamiliar cultural context, so that he into an exhibition.' (Certainly having ing a point, in the style, say, of the is not seen as an inspired half-mad the name has meant that Shell-a recent, successful exhibition Rubens man working out his obsessions in Dutch firm-gave more money to this and the Italian Renaissance. isolation, but as an artist in constant exhibition than any sponsor in the So how does this exhibition make dialogue with his comrades.' Sounds history of arts patronage in Australia. its serious historical point? There are familiar enough. Different pictures, Esso may have 'presented' Rubens, 63 works, 24 of them by Van Gogh. similar intent. The Van Gogh in Aries but not with the razzamatazz of Shell Which ones, you ask? Well there is a and Van Gogh in Saint-Remy and a they 'present' Vincent certain reluctance on the part of the Auvers exhibitions, held in 1984 and VanGogh.) National Gallery of Victoria to let us 1986 respectively at New York's Met know this before the show opens, just ropolitan Museum of Art, were quite W ITHOUT PEOPLE and money flow in case we're expecting to see all the specific, different sorts of shows; but inginto the National Gallery of Victo famous ones-Starry Night, Sunflow another 1990 exhibition, Van Gogh ria and the Queensland Art Gallery, ers, A Cornfield with Cypresses-and and Modern Art: 1890-1914, first seen however, we won't see such big, ex are disappointed at not seeing them. in Essen and later in Amsterdam, out pensive exhibitions in the But Art Exhibitions Australia Ltd was lined the extent of Van Gogh's influ future. It's a bit of a bind if able to provide a list and there are ence in the 20 years after his death, an you don't want to over-pro some outstanding Van Gogh works outline followed by this exhibition. mote Van Gogh. How can It's all a part of including The Chair with the Pipe and The exhibition would not have you not? After all, the block The Portrait of the Postman Joseph happened without Mollison's drive buster exhibition is a pan of the big new Roulin, but will it be enough, given and experience, but considering this the leisure industry and Vin that the Van Gogh works carry the line-up of exhibitions it would seem cent Van Gogh-His Sourc development show? that when he visited the Rijksmuse es, Genius and Influence will The other 39 pictures either chose um seeking to borrow pictures, he was have to compete for the con in the tourist themselves-26 of them are from presenting a familiar enough line on sumer dollar over the sum Australia--or were chosen to reveal the demythologising of Van Gogh. I mer. It's all a part of the big industry; what something of the source and influ suspect the museum directors had new development in the ence of Van Gogh's work. Among the heard it all before, but the Australian tourist industry; what the art the art historian sources are the work of Millet and gallery-going public haven't, so per historian Anne-Marie Willis some mid-19th century British and haps they decided to do us a favour, calls' cultural consumption,' Anne-Marie Willis Dutch painters, as well as works by given that very little of Van Gogh's and what the trade calls 'ex French contemporaries such as Seurat, work has been seen in Australia. periential tourism' or 'val calls 'cultural Manet, Pissarro, Monet, Signac and, Mollison is aware that any exhibi ue-added experience'. Van by all accounts, most marvellously, tion which sets out to demythologise Gogh is very much a part of consumption,' and Gauguin. Hisinfluenceon other paint Van Gogh runs the inevitable risk of this development, as is Abo ers, (if only for lO minutes in some remythologising him. (Then again, riginal culture. We get to see what the trade cases) is demonstrated in works by maybe we need to do that.) Perhaps it the Rijksmuseum pictures Kandinsky, Braque and Nolde. The is why he is somewhat wary about now because it's off-peak for calls 'experiential exhibition does not include any work over-promoting the exhibition. Not tourism in Holland, but done after 1916, so that if the notion of that the Victorian State Government come the northern summer touris1n' or 'value- tracing Van Gogh's influence on and Tourism Victoria want to over each Van Gogh is expected Australian artists like Grace Cossing promote it, but for the first time, as back on the walls in Amster added experience'. ton Smith, Jolm Perceval and Brett part of the push into 'event-related' dam, welcoming the visitors. Whiteley was considered, it was in the tourism, the State Government has With all the talk of mon Van Gogh is very end rejected, because it would have encouraged Tourism Victoria to get ey, myth and influence what moved the exhibition way beyond the right behind an exhibition. There'll be about the pictures them much a part of this bounds set by James Mollison: 'a con the vision board display at Melbourne selves? What is it about them tained exhibition that does explain Airport, flags up in the city, irises and that moves us and fascinates development, as is the genius of Van Gogh .. . where he miniature sunflowers in boxes out us still? For Mollison, the comes from and where he side the gallery in St Kilda Rd., dis sense of immediacy in the Aboriginal culture. wentto'. plays in city department stores, pack painting is 'greater than ages for New Zealand and interstate [with] Raphael or Rembrandt. There R ADING SOME OF the newspaper visitors, all with a view to pre-selling we don't have the feeling that we're in reports on the exhibition, you might the exhibition. the presence of the man who made think it's the first time this sort of There is plenty of advice around them.' When Robert Hughes reviewed show has been mounted. In Australia, suggesting they are on a winner with the 1984exhibition Van GoghinArles, yes; elsewhere, no. The Art Gallery of Van Gogh, but Mollison is not so he referred to the same immediacy Ontario's 1981 Van Gogh exhibition, sure-and anyway, 'it's just another and the way in which 'all signs of VOLUME 3 NUMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 49 E XHIBITIONS: 2 MARGARET SIMONS extreme feeling in Van Gogh were tempered by his longing for concision and grace.' Two years later, Hughes Looldng up north referred to the beauty and emotional range of the work Van Gogh did in the 'IERE IS AN IRONY in the selective hands arc hanging on to the edge of the last year of his life. wa y Australian perspectives of South boat- but they come from the depths It is this, and not simply the sto EastAsia have changed. When it comes inside, rather than trying to climb ries which surround them, that ena to economics, we recognise and even into the boat from the outside. bles Van Gogh's images to have a envy the energy of our neighbours. At the entrance to the exhibition symbolic power. The tree, or fi eld, or Our future, we are told, depends on is a giant incense stick, slowly smoul fl ower is so powerfully, immediately ca tching the tails of the tige rs. Yet our dering. A second look reveals human present as a tree, or fi eld, or fl ower, understanding of the arts of South faces embedded in the stick, waiting that we ca n speak of it as symbolic. It's East Asia is frozen in time. Tourists go for the fra grant flame to reach them . this sort of intensity, an intense fid el to the region and expect to see ancient This is a work by Malaysian artist ity to appearances, which explains dances, costumes andgold -platcdBud Kungyu Licw. Another work, by Indo som ething of Van Gogh's attraction. dhas. We have been interested only in nesian Dang Christano, consists of That, and the stories we go on the classical- art as art history. suspended 'trees' with fl owers-for telling ourselves, as if we were at Thanks to the director and staff of those who have lost their lives-scat- tempting to rem ythologise Van Gogh. the Queensland Art Ga ll ery, the icc is tered undernea th them . Much of the Not in the sense of telling sweet lies being shattered. The result is surely Indonesian work cl ea rl y refers to about him, but rather, as the Benedic one of the most exciting- and under human-rights abuses, yet the Indone tine monk Sebastian Moore once said, publicised-exhibitions mounted in sian co-operated with the gallery in 'because myths arc the way we talked Australia in recent times. The Queens the exhibition. about ourselves before we learnt to land Art Gallery is staging the first of In a catalogue essay, the gallery's lie'. Perhaps the Van Gogh story gives a series of Asia-Pacific Triennials of director of intcrna tiona! programs, us access to the most vital of our contemporary art, coin ciding with Caroline Turner, points out that art myths, the m yth of transformation, at Brisbane's Warana Festiva l of the Arts. critics have large ly ignored the devel whose hea rt ' is the sense of the human The exhibition is easily the most chal opment of art in the region, or have self as uniquely precious'. Can art do lenging part of the festiva l. seen it in terms of its integration of that? Maybe. We will have to wait and The paintings, sculptures and in western tradition. Socio-economic see. • stallations on show at the gallery are contexts have been over-emphasised bold and fresh, and one can only won at the cost of m ystical-aesthetic con Damian Coleridge is a freelance critic der at the effect the triennials will texts. 'The history oft he region,' T um and writer. have on Australian artists. The eff ect er writes, 'is one of cul tural engage is potentially profound, and an impor ment and adaptation which may make tant part of our growing rela tionship Westem influences seem m inor to with Asia. The Australia Council made future historians.' one of its largest individual grants to Nearly 200 works by 76 artists assist with the exhibition, and priva te from 12 countries and Hong Kong are Abbotsford Cycles sponsors have also helped. included in the exhibition, in what T he exhibition incl udes Araya gallery director Doug Hall describes We can look after your bicycle, from Rasdja rmream sook's boxes of men and as 'the most extensive, intellectuall y a new tube to a full servi ce and their refl ections. Bl ack metal boxes, demanding project the ga ll ery has ever repaint. each open, contain white outlines of undertaken'. Further triennials are We ca n help you to make cycling nude figures, which are refl ected in planned for 1996 and 1999. more comfo rtable, conveni ent and deep, dark still pools underneath. The Queensland Art Gallery is ad reli able. There is a stillness about the imagery, venturous and energetic in ways that We sell Australian-made Pro-tour the dark water and the reflections. can elude its southcm counterparts. bicycles, Velocity aluminium rims, Araya Rasdj armrearnsook says 'It is T he triennial is the product of that Atom and Headway helmets, and the line between people in an open spirit, and of the keenness of the over- Netti clothing. space and their shadows ... between seas artistic communities to commu 299 Johnston Street the fig hters and the losers; it's the line nica te with Australia. • Abbotsford, VI C 3067 where one decides whether to live or Telephone 41 7 4022 die ... or in a Buddhist way, it's the Margaret Simons is a free lance writer dividing line between knowledge and and a regular contributor to Eureka ignorance.' Street. Another of her sculptures is a thin black boat, again fill ed with dark, • The 1\\ia J>aci(ic Triennial o( refl ecti ve liquid (it is motor oi l), in Conlcmpowrv Art is on exhibi tion at ROUE"'"" DUUCTRIC[ which is refl ected a shape that might the Qucen'i l 50 EUREKA STREET • NOVEMBER 1993 sounds familiar, but In theLineofFire Mountains' mist, Ellis treats his aban is saved from being just another chase doned faith with affection. At univer movie by the superb performances of sity, when all that seems to be left of Eastwood and Malkovitch. Indeed, the his character's Adventism is fear of latter gives such a convincing portray the Apocalypse, the Adventists are al of evil incarnate that he should still'mypeople'. And Elkins/Ellis con beware of being pigeonholed by cast tinues to crash through relationships ing directors as Hollywood's new res compelled by a troubled desire for ident psycho. After all, Bruce Dem 'fullness of response'-his former pas and Jack Nicholson are at the mid-life tor's' good and sufficient' definition of crisis stage as well. love. -Ray Cassin But, despite some deft dialogue and great cast-especially Alice Card ner and Miranda Otto-The Nostrad Apocalypse bore amus Kid doesn't quite work. By the end I had had enough of Elkin's relent The Nostradamus Kid, dir. Bob Ellis less lustful depression, and wanted to (independent cinemas), is a kind of block out the voiceover. Secret Diary of Adrian Mole with a -Jane Buckingham generous dose of religious anxiety. Despite Ellis's protestations that the film is not autobiographical, it is im Life as it is Better and better possible to avoid identifying the hero, Ken Elkin (Noah Taylor), with Bob Blackfellas (independent cinemas), dir. In the Line of Fire, dir. Wolfgang Ellis. In case you forget whose story it James Ricketson, is set among the Petersen (Hoyts). Clint Eastwood is in really is, Ellis' mellifluous voiceover Nyoongahs, who live in Perth and the danger of giving mid-life crises a good is there to keep you on track. south-west of WA, and is based on name. Having demythologised the Archie Weller's novel, DayoftheDog. western-and his own career-in La Dolcissima Vita The main character, Doug Dooligan, Unforgiven, he has now co-operated gets out of jail and wants a job so he in the shredding of his other screen As Emeka Street went to press, can buy back his father's country prop persona, the tough-guy cop. And, as in news came that Federico Fellini, erty. But he's torn between going Unforgiven, the tone of regret never long-ailing, was near death and straight and old mates like Pretty Boy becomes irksome because there isn't had been anointed by a hospital Floyd, a charming small-time crim. a Sensitive New Age Whine to be chaplain. So no film competition Doug falls for a wild young girl called heard. this month, folks, just a tribute to Polly, and the whole crew looks to be The line of fire in question is the thedirectorofLaDolce Vita (from headed for a fall. path that an assassin's bullet must whence comes the above still), La The film is as rough as a hessian travel in order to connect with the Strada, Juliet of the Spirits, Gin bag, and rightly so. It shows the reali body of the US president. Frank Hor ger and Fred and many more. ties facing black urban fringe-dwell rigan (Eastwood) is a Secret Service The winner of September's film ers-boredom, no jobs, police harass agent, i.e. if the need should arise, his competition was Kim Miller, rec ment, drinking, footy, hot cars and job is to place his own body between tor of the Anglican parish of St petty crime. John Moore (Doug) is the bullet and the president. On a Alban's, Kooringal, NSW. Kin1's strong and expressive, and David significant occasion early in his career, best (i.e. worst) dinosaur joke was: Ngoombujarra (Pretty Boy) is perhaps in Dallas on 22 November 1963, Hor Q. What do you call the bishop of a future star. Jaylene Riley (Polly) and rigan failed to do this. Now, 30 years Jurassic Rome? Lisa Kinchela (her older sister) are later, he is trying to prevent a psychot A. Pontifisaurus Rex. convincing. The supporting cast and icformerCIAagent, Mitch Leary (John locations give it a sense of life that Malkovitch), from assassinating an overcomes creaky turns in the plot, other president. In the process, Horri Elkin's escape from a regimented and miscasting in the role of Doug's gan takes what amounts to a remedi Seventh Day Adventist childhood into white mother. al course in sexual politics from a the sexual turmoil of Sydney in the Overall the film is pretty good, young female Secret Service agent, '60s provides some sharp and often funny in parts and moving in others. It Lilly Raines (Rene Russo). funny insights into religious disillu recalls Australian films from the 1970s Those are the elements: the good sionment and tortured adolescence. such as John Duigan's Mouth to guy and the bad guy who seek to But, although The Nostradamus Kid Mouth-not slick, but a lot of heart. manipulate each other's insecurities, is critical of Adventist beliefs, it has Ricketson, who also wrote the screen and the wider context of an America no brief to vilify the sect. In the film's play, is said to have spent five years that is still living on the psychic lega idyllic holiday-camp scenes, which working on it, and consulting the cy of the Kennedy assassination. It all are full of horses galloping in Blue Nyoongah community. 'Over the VoLUME 3 NuMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 51 Talking Points years I've put m ore and more of with it. Brenda Fricker, as Charlie's makes the clever, poignant script seem myself into the story,' the film 's lustful wife, May, is also a treat, and so almost redundant. In 'Mr Chuck' the Australia publicity notes quote him as say is Anthony La Paglia as Charlie's friend, image of the Aboriginal boy touching What Kind of Republic? ing. MaybeBlackfellas would have Tony Giardino, a cop who desperately a glass wall displays his wretchedness An open forum at St Mary's been even better if it had stuck wants to be like his heroes, Starsky more starldy than any words: the evil Co ll ege, Melbourn e Un ive rsity, closer to Archie Weller's original and Hutch. that licks his feet is more than ghostly. Swanston Street, Parkville. story. It is a good thing these characters - Jane Buckingham Speakers: Tony Blacksh ield, Mar -Mark Skulley are so rich; otherwise the limited scope jorie Thorpe, Geoff Clark and joce offered to Travis and to Amanda Plum lyn Sc utt. Admiss ion: $5, or $3 mer, as Harriet's cryptic sister, Rose, cone. Contact: Rainbow Alli ance, Home and away 35 Argy le Street, Fitzroy 3065 . Hatchet match would be annoying. Their talents de Tel (03)419 3613. serve to be better used. Homelands, dir. Tom Zubricki (inde So I Married an Axe Mmderer, dir. -Jon Greenaway pendent cinemas). This documentary Mass for East Timor Thomas Schlamme (Hoyts). A might have been made for refugee movie with a title like this ought chaplains, though it is of much wider The East Timorese community of Victoria invites yo u to attend a to mock itself and a few others as Tropical haunts interest. It tells the story of a family Ma ss fo r East Timor at St Patri ck's well, and fortunately this one does. that emigrates from El Salvador to Ca th edral, Ea st Melbou rn e, on Charlie McKenzie, (Mike My BeDevil, dir. Tracey Moffa t (independ Australia, and studies their life in Fri day ·12 November at 8pm. The ers of Wa yne's World fame), is a ent cinemas), tells three tales of evil Australia and the retum of the hus pr in cipal conce lebrant will be pretentious beat poet who per and hauntings in Australia's tropical band and wife to El Salvador. Bi shop Bela of East Timor. There forms in a club on Jack Kerouac north. They are drawn from Moffat's The interest of Homelands lies in will also be a fund -rais ing dinner Lane in San Francisco. He finds childhood m emories of stories told by the way that Zubricki is drawn into for East Timor at Central Hall, 20 Harriet (Nancy Travis), the girl of relatives, and display, in a lighter vein, the lives of his subjects, who describe Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, on 15 his dreams, working behind the the sam e artistic ingenuity as her ac their lives and conflicts in intimate November at 7 .30pm. Ti ckets: counter of a butcher shop. The claimed short film, Night Cries: A detail. The filmmaker, like the chap $30, ava il able from the Timorese Association of Victoria, tel (03) dream begins to turn sour, howev Rural Tragedy. lain, is drawn into a world that is 302 1896. er, when he reads a tabloid news BeDevil toys with our expectations foreign to him, and the wanderings of paper story about a serial killer of Australian indigenous and migra nt body and spirit of those whom he Families and Violence and realises that the details of culture. The angry, abused Aboriginal meets clearly lead him to refl ect on Harriet's history match details in boy in 'Mr Chuck' is set against the his own identity. That has also been A conference at Macquarie Un i the story. irrepressibly cheerful, Evian Water m y own experience as a refugee versity, Sydney, on 4-5 February 1994, sponsored by Austra li an Myers shows his versatility by drinking, country-and-western sing chaplain. Catho li c Universi ty and Cen ta playing not only Charlie but also ing Aboriginal woman in 'Choo Choo Perhaps, too, Zubricki is like a care. Goals: to ex plore factors Charlie's father, Stuart. As the lat Choo Choo'. In the third, least eff ec chaplain in that he identifies m ore contributing to violence in Aus ter, he almost steals the show from tive, story the friendship is tested by easily with the woman of the family trali an families, and to in vestiga te himself. Stuart, who looks like a the dem ands of his sm all-time, com i than with the man, but ultimately is strateg ies for addressing violent cross between Andy Warhol and cal ambition. made an outsider to the lives of both behaviour. Co ntact: Chr istin e one of the Proclaimers, has a Glas But BeDevil offers more than by the strangeness of their m emories Trimingham, tel (02 ) 739 2248, wegian accent strong enough to humour and insight. It is a showcase and of the world of guerrilla warfare in fax (02) 739 2105. strip paint and a caustic wit to go not only for Moffat's talents, but also which they last found a home. T he for those of cinem a tog more articulate the couple becom e, rapher Geoff Burton the woman in personal terms and the and production design- man in social analysis, the less the • CollinsDove A Division of HarperCollinsPublishers er Stephen Curtis. The filmmaker understands. He becomes Publis hed in the same we ek as the Pope's encycl ical, film's very ordinary part of their li ves, but remains an Veritatis Splendor, On Bsing Catholic Today deals c h aracters-o ld observer. with - as does the encyclical -fundamental issues in drunks, nouveaux In the fi lm's final sequence, moral theology and invites reade rs to ask themselves: riches housewives and Zubricki, again like a chaplain, seeks 'What kind of person should I be ?' Writing in a style town pedestrians-arc a way to describe this story of dis accessible to professionals and non-professi onals pushed into extraordi placement. Another refugee, from alike, Australian Jesuit Arnold Hogan introduces the nary real and surreal Chile, says: 'We know where we arc two major schools of moral thinking in the Catholic landscapes, where be born. But where we shall die, no one Church today. devilment pricks knows.' It is the moving end of a through the surface, moving film. 'An illuminating and lucid account of the contentious bubbles up from I had only one reservation. Much issues in Catholic morality today.' swamps and transfix of what the refugee chaplain knows is es cars. covered by the confessional seal. Even when pre Should there be something of the same PO Box 316 senting prosaic reali sort for makers of docum entaries when • Blackburn Vic 3130 ty, BeDevil's visual they enter private lives? Collins Tei:(03) 895 8137 ISBN : 1 86371 292 5 power somcti m es -Andrew Hamilton SJ Dove- fax: (03) 895 8181 RRP $18.95 52 EUREKA STREET • NovEMBER 1993 Good companions makes joy of poetic language. And in Emeka Street is happy to rec HISTORY OF THE ommend the latest (lOth) edi Emma Thompson, as the word-sharp Beatrice, it has one of this century's tion of Halliwell's Filmgoer's AUSTRALIAN great exponents. It is hard to imagine Companion, that A-to-Z of just CHURCHES how Thompson can get any better. about everyone, and every topic, IAN BREWARD (There are still the tragedies, of course associated with the cinema and ... ). In Much Ado she is caustic, mod The first general history of all its history. The first edition to Au stralian ch urches in Austral be produced since the death of est and vengeful. She even makes embodied sense of hack praise like ian society, dealing with their Leslie Halliwell, it is edited by 'radiant'. Branagh is an engaging Ben roles in the life of the states and John Walker, who brought out edick, improving as his role darkens, the territories of the the 8th edition of Halliwell's but delightful also as he cavorts in the Film Guide in 1991. Invest in Commonwealth. $24.95 pb fountain, baptised in love. both the Halliwell'bibles', and you can settle aU those family Michael Keaton (Dogberry) and Ben Elton (Verges) make a manic pair. The arguments about late-night opening-night audience (predmninant movies. (They certainly help set AUSTRALIAN CINEMA ly young) loved them for their sham e tle arguments at Emeka Street.) Edited by less Python stealings, but also for their SCOTIMURRAY invention. Pity that Keaton's Irish Shakespeare & Co. accent shades off into mumble som e Written by eight noted times. As theyounglovers, KateBeck cinema critics, with over Much Ado About Nothing, dir. Ken insale (Hero) is adequate but Robert 300 striking stills, Austral neth Branagh (Greater Union); Mac Sean Leonard (Claudio) tries to do ian Cinema is a compre beth and Othello, both dir. Orson Method with his sooty eyebrows hensive overview of the Welles (independent cinemas). It's high not enough in a play/film that runs so world's fastest developing season for Shakespeare again, exactly strongly on words. Richard Briers is a and most vigorous film as the drama merchant of Avon might convincing and sympathetic Leona to cultures. $24.95 pb have liked it. Branagh's sunny, bound and Denzel Washington a genial Don to-be-a-hit Much Ado is playing si Pedro. As his bastard brother, Don ALLEN & UNWIN multaneously in state capital cine John, the villain spoiler of pastoral mas, and the restored and digitally harmony, Keanu Reeves looks satur nine but can't act. remastered Mercury Theatre produc BLACKFRIARS tions of Welles' Macbeth (1948) and The film's froth is balanced by a Othello (1 952) are doing the art-house great closing scene in which the cam circuit. era draws slowly up and back from Branagh's second screen Shake epithalamic revelry until, in a god's speare is an exuberant, open-hearted eye view, the players become Bruegel "t~ 0\(\.~ affair that will draw a new, young ants, fixed in their hapless glee. Venge Dominican public for the play with its witty filch ance, Don John and the follies of hon Retreat & Conference Centre ings from screen classics: the horse our crouch, off-camera left. In the PH ILLIP AVENUE, WATSON, ACT men out of The Magnificent Seven, Shakespearean landscape, Death is the the comedy duo out of Monty Python, shadow of celebration. The Retrea t & Conference Centre is part of Blackfriars and Three Musketeer pranks from You have to be grateful for the Dominica n Priory, situated in pleasant surroundings everywhere else in the his tory of screen opportunity to see the restored Othello in North Ca nberra. Th e spacious building includes a comedy. But the film doesn't rely on and Ma cbeth, but Welles' best efforts peaceful enclosed ga rd en with plenty of walking comic cross-referencing for its went elsewhere-in the rarely shown space. The M ount Ainslie-Majura Reserve is w ithin strength. From the outset, against the Chimes at Midnight orin Carol Reed's walking distance of the Priory. competition of a Tuscan summer (in The Third Man, which Welles did on lieu of Shakespeare's Messina), it the side to earn more money for Oth It provides single- room accommodation for 60 peo ello (filmed intermittently over three pl e (or 90 people with shared accommodation), with McLiammoir is the Ticket offer years). Michael hot/cold water and central heating in each room, and strength of Othello. His powdered and a large conference room holding up to 100 people, as The first 15 people to take out theatrical Iago has the chill, inexplica well as several small rooms. Th ere is additional space subscriptions to Emeka Street ble menace of an IRA executioner:. for small group work. Individual andorga ni zedgroup will receive double passes to 'Strangle her in her bed',-and Othel Retrea ts are ava ilable. see Like Water For Chocolate lo does. Macbeth is an obscure, ill at one of these Melbourne paced production, making one won All enquiries are welcome and should be directed to: cinemas: the Brighton Bay, der how completely Welles tmderstood the Longford and the Kino. Fill the play. And its stagey Scots accents The Co-ordinator in the form on the inside back would shame a Chum commercial. PO BOX 900, DICKSON ACT 2602 cover, and mark it 'film offer'. -Morag Fraser Phone: (06) 248 8253 Fax: (06) 247 6892 V O LUME 3 N UMBER 9 • EUREKA STREET 53 Doug testing S BS AAN A moeRAM •bout thew the arrival of2WS, the rivalry between shares the blame between Wendy ly pioneers of radio in the United the two in pursuit of the 'young adult' Harmer and several at1onymous gig States. Their problems in overcoming market (ru1d I use the term loosely) gling blokes. Harmer and her side sceptical public opinion were illus was a reliable constant on the Sydney kick, Jean Kittson, rehash familiar trated by the response of one old man radio scene, with competition personae from The Big Gig. The boys' to a vox pop on the amazing new especially fierce over the breakfast slot. role is less clear, although pathetic technology. 'I don't hold with furni In the blue comer, in more senses skits on the Olympics have featured ture that talks,' he said. It was hard not than one, is Triple M's Doug Mulray. prominently in the past weeks (farting to sympathise with that view at Mulray, who made his name on the to be introduced as a demonstration 4.30am on the day that the success of ultra-politically correct Triple J, has sport, that kind of thing). Sydney's Olympic bid wasrumounced, evolved (or regressed) into a self-con The atmosphere ofbothshows may when the furniture wasn't just talk sciously tasteless and 'controversial' be one of forced hilarity, but the rival ing, butscreamingitslungsout.'Wake presenter, whose stock-in-trade is ry is deadly serious. That's obvious up Sydney! Wake up Australia!' it crude innuendo. There'snothingMul simply from the absurd grandiosity shrieked, as if there was any choice in ray and his listeners appreciate more and ever-increasingvalue of the prizes the matter. And that was just the than a good joke about farting or a bit on offer every morning. 2DA Y offers ABC. of titillating byplay with his (female) $10,000 every hour to a caller just for Things were worse on Sydney's acolyte, Sam, whose sole function naming the singer and titleofonesong commercial stations, with 2UE's pop seems to be to act as the foil for Mul played to them. Mulray tops that by ulist talkback host and failed rugby ray's scintillating double entendres. giving away tickets to see Madonna league coach Alan Jones making sure The widow of an Australian soldier in Tokyo. The Moming Crew come that 'those who keep ranting and rav killed in Malaysia actually wrote to back with the ultimate prize. You've ing against the monarchy' were fully request 'at1Y fart jokes, or jokes about guessed it-a seat at the Olympics. informed about Princess Anne's hero balding short men', which would 'help All of which makes dismal enough ic role in the voting process. 2GB ease our pain'. Whatever listening. But the most remarkable knew better, however. Their resident gets you through, I suppose. thing about both shows (and 2DAYin shrink, Shirley Smith, assured us that particular) is the almost total collapse 'energy, positiveness and faith' were M ULRAY 1S APPEAL DEPENDS On of the barriers between news, sketch the key factors in Sydney's triumph. whether you find his strenuous at es, advertising, phone-ins, music and Try as you might, there's been no tempts to be offensive funny, or just chat. So-called news bulletins include escape from the Olympics. Sydney's plain offensive ('Speaking on behalf of barely-concealed plugs for products two highest-rating FM stations each the few heterosexuals in Sydney ... '). from companies like Nissan, which ran a phone-in poll on the vital question He's like the drunk at an office Christ appears to be marketing its new mod of whether the bid committee should mas party who thinks dropping his el solely as a news item (with depress get a ticker-tape parade through the trousers and exposing himself to wo ing success). city. And the (ex-)Minister for the men is a measure of their broadmind Theopinionsexpressedon2DAY's Olympic Bid, Bruce Baird, went on edness rather than his maturity. I£ you aptly-named 'Reaction Line' are also 2GB to boast about organising a re don't think it's terribly witty, you peddled as news, with the result that union of Stalag Luft B veterans for the must be some kind of prude, or, worse Kittson's attempted send-ups of news benefit of the Norwegian IOC mem still, gay. To judge by the ratings and broadcasters aren't so much parodies ber. the millions of bumper stickers in as pale imitations. Sponsorshipofrock Those two FM stations, 2MMM Sydney proudly proclaiming 'I'm Doug tours and events such as Triple M's and 2DA Y, have got more on their Dependent' (geddit?), it's a message 'Rocktober' extravaganza entwine the minds at the moment than the Olym that appeals pretty strongly to a large perfonner, the station and the spon pics (though not much more). The fact proportion of 20-somethings. soring company in one indivisible is, they can no longer claim the dubi Fartingand the Olympics are equal package. Advertising as entertain ous honour of topping the ratings, ly popular topics with the rival Mom ment, and entertainment as advertis having just been overtaken by the ing Crew on 2DAY.lt 's a similar mix ing, have never been marketed more upstart 2WS, which recently moved ture of conservative music choices successfully. No wonder we were per from AM. Triple M has counterparts ('the best from the '60s, '70s and '80s', feet for the Olympics. • with the same name in Perth, Bris but not '90s), feeble gags and helpless bane, Melbourne and soon in Adelaide, laughter whenever anyone mentions while 2DAY is linked with FOX-FM sex, which is about every 30 seconds. Mike Ticher is a Sydney joumalist. in Melboume and AM and FM sta But whereas Mulray's success is built He's just remembered how nice Mel tions in Canberra and Adelaide. Until around his own 'personality', 2DA Y bourne is around September. 54 EUREKA STREET • N OVEMBER 1993 Eureka Street Cryptic Crossword no.18, November 1993 Devised by Joan Nowotny IBVM ACROSS A parish without Sunday leader becomes social outcast. (6) 4 To keep the house in order, mop daily until the millenia! event. (8) 9, 10 Little problem to the French. (6,8) 12 Envisioning knightly life, mistake worker on the railway. (8) 13 Add 500 to media extravaganza to get symbol of royal power. (6) 15 Make a faux pas on the excursion? (4) 16 The miscreant exhibits the gender aspect of wrongdoing. (10) 19 The effect on health of mixing egg with bile? Nil. Or, at any rate, hardly significant' (10) 20 Return of emotion may be indicative of judgment. (4) 23 Sounds as if old flame wrote to use up-energy perhaps! (6) 27 Little Lulu ran around the Churchman. (8) 28 It's for counting the new AusCab trips. (6) 29 Rained down gifts to demonstrate Eastern communist liberality. (8) 30 Hidden word to deride me and humiliate me. (6) DOWN Solution to Crossword no.17, October 1993 1 Offer the gift here and now! (7) 2 Improving the club by replacing umpire or dynasty' (9) 3 Covering expression of boredom? No question to begin with! (6) 5 Sway back at the sneering look. (4) 6 It's strangely alarming to be on the edge. (8) 7 Fix it firmly in mind that I'm on the garden-plot. (5) 8 Just fancy! Dear me! Right here a visionary! (7) 11 You may call Bjorn Borg an iceberg, but it is part of his constitution. (7) 14 Roars for the fire-pumps. (7) 17 0! That echo! Could be the cause of this pain! (9) 18 Contend with quarters of the European city. (8) 19 Unnecessary endless teases! (7) 21 Presidential avenue that I traversed between mother, daughter and son. (7) 22 Anguished bleats came from the animal stalls. (6) 24 In the camp at Iona there is a courtyard. (5) 26 Confront the dial to save prestige, perhaps. (4) EURI:-KA SJR[-EJ subscription form Please send me Eureka Street: for one year ($45 for lO issues, or $40 cone. for two years D for pensioners, students and unemployed.) D ($85, or $80 cone.) Name...... Address ...... Postcode ...... Country ...... Tel...... Date ...... Enc. chq/money order D Or debit: Bankcard D Visacard D Mastercard D Card no: I L_~~--L-~~--L-~~--L-~~--L_~_J __L_~ Card expiry date ...... Signature ...... 'They say it'll be over by Christmas, Mother-but if it Post orders to: Jesuit Publications, PO Box 553, isn't don't forget to renew my Eureka Street subscription. • Richmond VIC 3121. Payments in Australian currency only. We can, if you Will. Few forms of funding help the Burea u bett er in its long term planning and delivery of family services than w ills and bequests. The Bureau, established more than 50 yea rs, helps Ca tho lics and no n-Ca tholic families CATHOLI C FAM I LY WELFARE llURF:A U alike with profess ional se rvices which include marriage, family, child and gri ef For further in formation counse lling; child and youth suppo rt; piL'ast: w rit e to: pre-marriage programs; adoptio n and Repl y Paid 'o.5, pregnancy counselling se rvices. Ca 1holic F"mil y Welfare llun:au, If you are making o r updating your will P.O. Box 7. Nonh Ca rllon. Vic J054 please remember th e fam ilies that we can Tel: <03) 662 2033 F"x: <0.3) (,62 193·1 help, if you w ill.